1894. PROCEEDINGS OF TEE NATIONAL MUSEUM. 351 



clievrons are placed centrally. There are ten "cervical" vertebrae, 

 showing lower processes, which are i)laced in the center and contain 

 both catapophyses * and intercentra. 



The uenral spines are developed in the tail, but very little; in the 

 dorsal region they are short, vertical ridges, which are somewhat more 

 developed in the cervical region. 



The shoulder girdle and lielvis. — Ko trace of a shoulder girdle could 

 be found. The pelvis was represented not only by a rudimentary ileum, 

 as stated by Cope, but also by an ischium and pubis, wiiich are united 

 proximally. The pubis has an obturator foramen. These bones I only 

 found in the macerated skeleton. 



Dermal ossifications. — By all authors it is stated that dermal ossiiica- 

 tions in the skin are absent; this is not correct; they are well developed. 



I now give the osteological characters of the family Anniellid;e: 

 Teeth large, few, fang-like, with short, swollen base, and indications 

 of grooves. Palate toothless. Skull api^roaching the Amphisbieuian 

 type; no interorbital septum; parietals suturally united with supraoc- 

 cipital; petrosal greatly produced in front; an epipterygoid ; squamosal 

 present, but small ; quadratojugal absent ; postorbital arch ligamentous ; 

 a supraorbital bone; pterygoids not in contact with basicranial axis, 

 except by the basipterygoid processes; an infraorbital fossa; pnemax- 

 illary single; nasal and frontal divided; parietal single; priB- and post- 

 frontal in contact. Caudal vertebra- segmented; osteodermal plates. 



The Anniellidic are in the same relations to the Anguidic, as are the 

 Acontiidie to the Scincida^ ; but they are still more degenerated, for in 

 the Acontiidic we still find a very rudimentary quadratojugal. 



I shall discuss the relationship of all these degenerate families more 

 fully in my paper on the Amphisbaiuia. 



* I call catapophysis the lower process in the cervicals, to which the intercentra 

 (hypapophysis) are attached ; the lower processes in the vertebrie. of snakes, for 

 instance, are catapophyses and not hypapophyses. 



