DESCRIPTION OF REPTILES. 209 
type of vertebra from that of the recent and known tertiary Crocodilian genera ; 
it became necessary, therefore, to ascertain what form of vertebra might be so 
associated with the fossil Gavial-like jaws and teeth in the Bracklesham eocene 
deposits, as to justify the conclusion that such vertebre had belonged to the 
same species as the jaws. Now, the only Crocodilian vertebre that have yet 
been found at Bracklesham, so far as I can ascertain, present the proczlian type 
of articular surfaces of the body, a & 5, like that in Mr. Dixon’s collection, fig. | 
of the above woodcut. This vertebra answers to the last cervical or first dorsal 
vertebra in the existing Crocodilians, and accords in its proportions with that in 
the Gangetic Gavial: the parapophysis, p, [lower transverse process articulating 
with the head of the rib] is relatively shorter antero-posteriorly. The broad 
rough neurapophysial sutural surfaces, n, meet upon the middle of the upper 
part of the centrum ; the elsewhere intervening narrow neural tract sinks deeper 
into the centrum than in the modern Gavial, but is perforated, as in that species, 
by the two approximated vertical vascular fissures. The hypapophysis, hs, (pro- 
cess from the inferior surface of the centrum) has been broken off in the fossil, 
but it accords in its place and extent of origin with that in the anterior dorsal 
vertebra of the Gavial. Assuming the fossil proceelian vertebre from Brackles- 
ham, and the above-described vertebra in particular, to have belonged to the 
same individual or species as the portions of fossil jaw, figs. 2 & 3, then these 
mandibular and dental fossils must be referred to the genus Gavialis, or to the 
long-, slender- and subcylindrical-snouted Crocodilia with procelian vertebre. 
This genus is now represented by one or two species peculiar to the great rivers 
of India, more especially the Ganges ; and the fossil differs from both the Gavialis 
gangeticus, Auct., and from the, perhaps nominal, Gavialis tenuirostris, Cuv., in 
the form and relative size of the teeth. The crown is less slender in the fossil 
than in the existing Gavials, and less compressed, its transverse section being 
nearly circular. There are two opposite principal ridges, but they are less marked 
than in the existing Gavials; and are placed more obliquely to the axis of the 
jaw, z.e. the internal ridge is more forward, and the external one more backward, 
when the tooth is in its place in the jaw. In the modern Gavial the opposite 
ridges, besides being more trenchant, are nearly in the same transverse line. 
The other longitudinal ridges on the enamel of the fossil teeth are more nume- 
rous, more prominent and better defined, than in the existing Gavials : the inter- 
mediate tracts of enamel present the same fine wrinkles in the fossil as in the 
existing Gavials’ teeth. 
