210 DESCRIPTION OF REPTILES. 
On comparing the fragment of the fossil lower jaw with a specimen of a lower 
jaw of the Gavialis gangeticus of the same breadth across the symphysial part, 
at the intervals of the sockets, which breadth is 3 centimeters (1 inch 3 lines), I 
find that the longitudinal extent of 10 centimeters (near 4 inches) of a ramus of 
the fossil jaw includes five sockets; but in the Gangetic Gavial compared the 
same extent of jaw includes seven sockets, showing that the teeth are fewer as 
well as larger in the fossil Gavial in proportion to the breadth of the jaws. 
The second portion of the jaw, fig. 3, is from the part where the rami diverge 
posteriorly from the symphysis, and near the posterior termination of the den- 
tary series. Here the teeth become shorter in proportion to their thickness, 
and somewhat closer placed together: there is a shallow depression (ce, c) in each 
interspace of the teeth, for the reception of the crowns of the opposite teeth 
when the mouth is shut. These depressions are longer, deeper and better de- 
fined in the fossil than in the recent Gavial of the same size. 
The fragments of jaw and teeth of the fossil Gavial of Bracklesham show ex- 
amples of young teeth penetrating the base of the old ones, according to the law 
of succession and shedding of the teeth which characterises the existing Croco- 
dilia: fig. 3 shows the apex of one of the successional teeth at d; and fig. 4 d the 
hollow base of the same incompletely formed tooth seen from below. 
Besides the fossil jaws, teeth and vertebr of the extinct Gavial, an entire 
femur (fig. 8) of a Crocodilian has been discovered in the eocene deposits at 
Bracklesham, which, in its proportions, agrees with that bone in the Gavial of 
the Ganges. Cuvier, in his comparison of the bones of the Gavial with those 
of the Alligators and true Crocodiles, merely observes, ‘‘ La forme des os du 
Gavial ressemble aussi prodigieusement a celle des os du Crocodile, seulement 
les apophyses €pineuses des vertébres sont plus carrées*.”’ 
With regard to the femur, this bone is more slender in proportion to its 
length in the Gangetic Gavial than in the Crocodilus biporcatus or the Alligator 
lucius, and the anterior convex bend of the shaft commences nearer the head of 
the bone; and in these characters the fossil femur from Bracklesham corre- 
sponds with the modern Gavial, and differs from the Crocodiles and Alligators, 
and also from the Crocodilus Hastingsie, of which species specimens of the 
fossil femur have been kindly submitted to me by the Marchioness of Hastings 
and Alexander Pytts Falconer, Esq. The fossil femur of the Gavial from Brack- 
lesham (fig. 8) may therefore be referred, with the utmost probability, to the same 
* Ossemens Fossiles, 4to0, tom. v. pt. 2. p. 108. 
