THE YEAR'S VERTEBRATE 

 PALAEONTOLOGY 



BV R. LYDEKKER, F.R.S. 



The following article is written on very similar lines to the 

 one dealing with the same subject in this journal a year ago ; 

 and the introductory remarks in the latter will in the main 

 apply in the present instance. It may, however, be well to 

 repeat the statement that the publications referred to do not 

 (and from the nature of the case cannot) represent anything 

 like a complete record of the year's work in the palaeontology 

 of vertebrates. They are, in fact, merely the more important 

 of those which have come under the writer's personal notice 

 up to the date of sending the proof of the article to press. 

 The opportunity has been taken to refer to a few papers 

 published in 1906 which had not come to hand when the 

 article for that 3'ear was compiled. 



As was the case last year, there appears to be no startling 

 or epoch-making discovery in this branch of palaeontology to 

 record ; although a large amount of valuable work, either in 

 describing new forms, or (which is at least equally important) 

 adding to our knowledge of those already known to science, 

 has been accomplished. From the standpoint of geographical 

 distribution, the most important event of the year in the 

 present department of science is undoubtedly the discovery 

 of remains akin to the golden moles of Southern Africa in 

 the Tertiary rocks of North America ; a discovery which 

 largely aids in explaining the anomalous distribution of this 

 and the kindred families of the Insectivora. 



Commencing with papers dealing with stratigraphical and 

 faunistic palaeontology, reference may first of all be made to 

 one by Prof H. Osborn, published in the Bulletin of the 

 American Museum of Natural History, vol. xxiii. p. 237, on 

 the Tertiary mammalian horizons of North America. Although 

 confessedly a preliminary introduction to a fuller work, this 

 paper gives much valuable information with regard to the 



501 



