208 
NOTES UPON SOME FOSSIL REPTILIAN REMAINS 
FROM THE VWARBURTON RIVER,. NEAR LAKE 
EYRE. 
By A. Zrerz, F.L.S., C.M.Z.8., &c., Assistant Director of the 
S.A. Museum. 
[Read September 5, 1899. ] 
In the year 1859 Prof. R. Owen described and figured some 
fossils in the Phil. Trans. of the Royal Society, London, vol. 
CXLIX., consisting of three vertebre of a gigantic land lizard 
from the (Pleistocene?) deposits forming the bed of a tributary 
of the Condamine River, West of Moreton Bay, and named it 
Megalania prisca. In his description he points out its close 
relationship to the recent Varanide. For vomparison with the 
fossils, figures are also given of the vertebre of the Varanus 
gioanteus from Central Australia. 
In a second paper by the same author, which appeared in 
1880, “dorsal,” ‘‘ sacral” and caudal vertebre, a skull* and a 
fragment of the same are figured and described. 
In the Proceedings of the Royal Society, London, 1886, Prof. 
R. Owen described and figured the sacrum and foot-bones, which, 
however, are stated by A. S. Woodward, Ann Mag. Nat. 
History, 1886, to be those of some large Marsupial. 7 
In 1888, A. S. Woodward, in a paper “On the Extinct 
Reptilian Genera Megalania (Owen) and JMMeiolania (Owen),” 
gives a summary of previous observations, and proposes the new 
name Meiolania Owenit for a Chelonian, which name has also 
been adopted by Lydekker in the Catalogue of Fossil Reptilia, 
&ec., in the British Museum. 
Woodward further states—‘ It appears that under Megalania 
prisca have been included (1) Lacertilian vertebre and an occi- 
pital fragment, (2) Chelonian skull and tail-sheath, (3) Marsupial 
foot-bones.” 
The first necessarily form the type specimens of the genus and 
species, and the last are obviously at once excluded from con 
sideration. 
In the 8.A. Government Geologist’s Report for 1894, in z 
supplementary paper by Mr. R. Etheridge, junr., Paleo ..slogist 
* A. S. Woodward states this skull to belong to a Chelonian. 
+ Diprotodon (A. Z.). 
+ See British Museum Catalogue of Fossil Reptilia, &c., Part II1., p. 166. 
