THE MAGAZINE 



OF 



NATURAL HISTORY. 



JANUARY, 1839. 



Art. I.— ^Observations upon the Fossil Jaws from the Oolitic Beds 

 at Stonesjield, named Didelphis Prevostii and Did. Bucklandii. — 

 By M. A. Valenciennes. 1 



~L he fossil bones of very small vertebrated animals discover- 

 ed in the oolitic beds of calcareous schist at Stonesfield, have 

 acquired great notoriety among geologists, in consequence of 

 the opinion formed respecting them by M. Cuvier, upon a 

 first inspection. 



It will be remembered that upon examining the rather mu- 

 tilated half jaw in the Oxford Museum, shown to him by Pro- 

 fessor Buckland, Cuvier recognised the characters of a mam- 

 mal, which he pronounced to be of the order Marsupialia. 



In no other way can we explain why Cuvier applied to 

 them the name of Didelphis. His ideas respecting them ap- 

 pear to convey precisely this meaning ; not only in the note 

 at page 359 of the second part of vol. v. of his ' Ossements 

 Fossiles,' but in the expressions which he uses in the text of 

 the same page. While enumerating the endless variety of 

 fossils found in the Stonesfield slate, he says, " and even, as 

 I am assured, two fragments of jaws, which, judging from a 

 hasty inspection made when at Oxford in 1818, seemed to 

 me to belong to some Didelphis" 



The extract from his note is as follows. — " It [the draw- 

 ing] confirms me in the idea which a first inspection had 

 given me : it is the jaw of a very small camassier, the grind- 

 ers of which very much resemble those of the opossums ; 



1 ' Comptes Rendus,' Sept., 1838, p. 572. 

 Vol. HI.— No. 25. n. s. b 



