280 POSSI. "BIRDS: 
Reptilian features which cannot be here noticed, few zoologists 
since Sir R. Owen’s description of the original specimen (Phil. Trans. 
1863, p. 33) have 
hesitated to accept 
Archxopteryz as a 
Bird ; but to suggest 
anything of its more 
immediate affinities 
or habits were vain, 
except that the form 
of its feet indicates 
a more or less ar- 
boreal mode of life. 
It is not easy to un- 
derstand the use of 
the singular _ tail, 
which appears a clumsy appendage—a notion which is perhaps 
justified by the certainty that such tails had disappeared in the 
birds next known to have existed.? 
These belong to the Cretaceous epoch, and since (with the 
exception of the Wealden) freshwater deposits of that age are rare 
in Europe, true ornithic remains are there uncommon. Many bones 
formerly referred to Birds have since proved to belong to Pterodac- 
tyls, and among them Cimoliornis from the English Chalk, Cretornis 
from that of Bohemia, and the so-called Palxornis? of the Sussex 
Wealden. But in 1858 Barrett discovered in the Upper Green- 
sand of Cambridgeshire remains described by Professor Seeley in 
1866 (Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist. ser. 3, xviil. p. 100) under the 
preoccupied name Pelagornis,? but in 1867 renamed Enaliornis 
(Index to Aves and Rep. Camb. Mus.; Q. Journ. Geol. Soc. xxxil. 
p- 509). These indicate a bird apparently allied to Colymbus, and 
not improbably to Hesperornis, of which more presently. Prof. 
Dames (K. Sv. Vet.-Akad. Handl. Bihang, xvi. pt. 4, No. 1) has 
described some remains from the Chalk of Southern Sweden under 
the name of Scaniornis, resembling those of Palzxlodus, to be again 
mentioned. From the Cretaceous rocks of North America, a much 
larger number of Bird-fossils have been described by Prof. Marsh, 
by whom they are referred to seven genera—A patornis, Baptornis, 
WING-BONES OF ARCHZOPTERYX. (After Vogt.) 
ec, Carpus ; h, Humerus; 2, m, Metacarpals; 7, Radius ; 
u, Ulna; 1, 2, 3, first, second, and third Digits. 
1 Certain remains from the Upper Jurassic of Wyoming being regarded as 
ornithic have received the name Laopteryx from Prof. Marsh (Am. Journ. Sci. 
ser. 8, xxi. p. 341), but in the absence of full description and figures our judg- 
ment may be suspended. 
2 Mantell, Medals of Creation, ed. 2, p. 804 (1844)—not to be confounded with 
Palxornis, Vigors, a Parrakeet—and = Pterodactylus clifti, Bronn, Ind. Pal. p. 895. 
3 This name had already been given by Lartet (Comptes Rendus, 1857, p. 740) 
to a different fossil noticed below. 
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