REPTILIA. 203 



Devonian and to the Trias, but wliich almost certainly belong- 

 to the latter. Professor Huxley concludes that Teleiyeton "pre- 

 sents not a single character approximating it towards the 

 type of the Permian Protorosauria, nor to the Triassic Ehyn- 

 cJwscmncs, and other (probably Triassic) African and Asiatic 

 allies of that genus, nor to the Mesozoic Dinosauria ; still 

 less can it be considered a ' generalised ' form, or as, in any 

 sense, a less perfectly organised creature than the Gecko, 

 whose swift and noiseless run over walls and ceilings sur- 

 prises the traveller in warmer climates than our own." In 

 its dentition, Telerpcton seems to have been " acrodont," and 

 it differs from most existing Lizards merely in having am- 

 phiccelous, and not procoelous, vertebra. 



Hyperocla/pedo7h \vas originally discovered in the " Elgin 

 Sandstones " along with Telerpeton, and it has since been 

 found in strata of Triassic age in India. It was described 

 by Professor Huxley as " a Saurian reptile about six feet 

 long, remarkable for the flattened or slightly concave artic- 

 ular surfaces of the centra of its vertebree, and for its well- 

 developed costal system and fore and hind limbs ; but more 

 particularly cliaracterised by its numerous series of sub- 

 cylindrical palatal teeth." Upon the whole, Huxley con- 

 cludes that Hyperodcqjedon is most nearly allied to the living 

 Splunodon {Hatteria) of New Zealand (fig. 554), upon the 



Fig. 554. — Side view of the skull of Sphenodon {Hatteria) punctata, the lower jaw being 

 removed. (After Giinther.) 



grounds that both " have amphicoelous vertebrte (those of the 

 ancient reptile being far less fish-like than those of the 

 modern one, be it noted); both have beak-like preemaxillffi, 

 not anchylosed together ; both have the inferior zygoma 



