VERTEBRATE PALAEONTOLOGY IN 1910 673 



pterna," remarks Dr. Scott, " such as the semi-taxeopod carpus 

 and tarsus, extensive articulation between the fibula and cal- 

 caneum, and the inadaptive method of digital reduction, are all 

 as distinctly marked in the highly specialised and monodactyle 

 Thoatherium as in the tridactyle and isodactyle genera. When 

 it is remembered that Thoatherium greatly surpasses the horses 

 in completeness of digital reduction the retention of so many 

 primitive characters becomes all the more remarkable and 

 significant." Several new forms are described. 



With the exception of a paper by Madame Pavlow on the 

 fossil elephants of Russia {Nouv. Mem. Soc. Imp. Nat. Moscow, 

 vol. xvii. pt. 2) nothing of any importance with regard to the 

 palaeontology of the Proboscidea has come under my notice. 



As it deals largely with sirenians and zeuglodonts, reference 

 may be conveniently made in this place to a paper by Dr. E. 

 Stromer, in Fortschritte naturwis Forschung, vol. ii. pp. 83-114, 

 entitled " Neue Forschungen iiber fossile Lungenatmende 

 Meeresbewohner," in which the phylogeny, adaptations, etc., 

 of the various groups are discussed in a specially interesting 

 fashion. 



A paper by Mr. A. Issel on certain fossil Italian mammals, 

 published in Mem. R. Ac. Lincei, ser. 5, vol. viii. pp. 191-224, 

 is largely concerned with Sirenia, and contains a full account 

 of the osteology of Felsinotherium. 



As regards cetaceans, considerable importance attaches to 

 a paper by Prof. F. W. True, Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 

 vol. xxviii. pp. 19-32, on the skeleton of a species from the 

 Patagonian Miocene, which has been described as Diochotichus 

 vanbenedeni, and also as Argyrodelphis benedeni. In the opinion 

 of Mr. True, the genus is referable to the Squalodoiitidce, of 

 which it constitutes a specialised type, characterised by the 

 single-rooted and nearly simple-crowned teeth. 



To vol. xii. pp. 139-4 of Proceedings and Transactions of 

 the Nova Scotian Institute of Science Prof. G. H. Perkins com- 

 municated a memoir on cetacean remains from the superficial 

 deposits of Canada. The main subject of the paper is a skeleton 

 in the museum at Halifax, discovered about 1873 on the 

 Jacquet River, New Brunswick, and identified as that of a 

 narwhal. Other skeletons, respectively in the museums of 

 MacGill University, Montreal, and Montpelier, belong to the 



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