158 Prof. H. G. Seeley. The Shoulder Girdle and [June 



Nothosaurus with that of Ichthyosaurus. I have not proposed 

 identify it with the coracoid foramen in the coracoid of a Lis 

 because I believe with Mr. Hulke that the precoracoid in Lizards is 

 ossified. And it is because I find no evidence that the precoracoid is 

 ossified in Nothosaurus (and I do not think there should be any con- 

 tention that it is ossified, now that Mr. Hulke accepts the existence 

 of clavicles in that genus) that I cannot regard the Lacertilian 

 coracoid as homologous with the Nothosaurian coracoid. It is sug- 

 gested by Mr. Hulke that the " coracoid foramen " in the Notho- 

 saurian coracoid is not to be found in the small open notch which faces 

 towards the scapula (/, fig. 6), bnt in the deep depression in the anterior 

 contour of the coracoid, which is posterior in position, and nearer to 

 the mesial line. This interpretation is founded upon Mr. Hulke's 

 reading of the Lacertilian coracoid ; but is unsupported by evidence, 

 because the structures compared are morphologically different, and 

 could only be brought into comparison, I submit, by first removing the 

 precoracoid from the Lacertilian shoulder girdle, when the notch or 

 foramen in the coracoid of the Lizard would face towards the scapula, 

 as in Nothosaurus, with a similar open angle between the two bones. 

 So far from the relations of what I regard as the cartilaginous pre- 

 coracoid of Nothosaurus to the scapula and coracoid being different from 

 what they are in Ichthyosaurus, they seem to me to be as nearly iden- 

 tical as possible in a widely divergent order of animals. For, in my 

 conception, there is no reason why the notches which Mr. Hulke regards 

 as representing the coracoid foramina should not entirely disappear 

 under ossification of the anterior margins of the coracoid bones, so 

 as to bring what are at present the two widely separated anterior 

 processes of the coracoids into close union with each other, when the 

 difference from Ichthyosaurus would be less apparent. As my 

 meaning has not been clearly understood, I offer a restoration of the 

 shoulder girdle of Nothosaurus mirabilis, showing what I conceive 

 to be the position of the cartilaginous precoracoid. 



This identification of the precoracoid foramen does not depend upon 

 the evidence from Nothosaurus only. There are small unnamed 

 Nothosaurs, figured by von Meyer in his ' Saurier 3es Muschelkalks,' 

 PL XXXIII, fig. 45, &c., showing on the inner side of the scapula a 

 notch with ossified margin (fig. 7,/), altogether distinct from the carti- 

 laginous margin of the bone behind and in front of it, and therefore 

 there is no doubt that both scapula and coracoid in those animals 

 contributed to the formation of a foramen between those bones, 

 which was completed by cartilage, as in the Ophthalmosaurs already 

 referred to. The argument concerning that cartilage is in every 

 respect the same as that offered in Ichthyosaurus. There is, however, 

 this difference. The animal is fundamentally different in general 

 organisation. Nothosaurs were for a long time included with the 



