II 



CATALOGUE OF SHIELD REPTILES. 



In the British Museum there is a well-grown Bpeoimen, 

 - long, of this species, ooUeoted in Cuha bj 

 M. Ramon de ' E ind Bent from the French Museum. 



I'u,. youi ns in spirits, Bent from Cuba by Mr. \Y. 



- v re almost 2 feet long, are polo brown, with 



.; dots on the head, and a dark Bpot on the middle of 

 many of the dorsal scutella; the face is irregularly tessel- 

 with Bquare brown -pots. 

 Cuvier desoribed the ' from two spe- 



cimens : — one in the Cabinet of the Academy of Sciences, in 

 irlj entire state: and the other, a verymutilated skin, 

 in the Museum, which also furnished him with the skull 

 figured in t. :>. t. 1. 2, 3, I. 5 of his work on Fossil Bones, 

 pp. 51-70. The original habitats of these specimens were 

 not marked. Bui M. Ramon de la Sagra sent a young 

 living Bpeoimen to the Jardin des Plantes, proving that 

 i is on American species: and it is probable thai the 

 tdile which Hernandez describes and figures as coming 

 from New Spain, under the name of Aquez palin, belongs 

 to this spi 



M. (.i ives, in the ' Annates Generales des Sciences I'hy- 

 siques de Bordeaux,' describes a Crocodile under the name 

 trw, from a specimen -which was formerly in 

 the Collection of the Academy of Bordeaux, but is now in 

 the Museum of that town. It was procured from M. 

 Journee, the surgeon of a ship that for some time traded 

 with the negroes of the coast of Congo. M. Bory de St.- 

 Vinceiit, for these reasons, thought it might have come 

 from Africa ; and he figured and described it under the 

 name of Orocodilus Oravesii in the Diet. Classique d'Hist. 

 Nat. iii. p. 109, t. . 



MM. Dumeril and Bibron observe that, when they asked 

 for a new account of the specimen, it was in such a had 

 condition that they could only reproduce the description 

 written by M. Graves. The study of the description and 

 hich are the only materials now left for the pur- 

 . lead to the idea that it was not distinct from Croco- 

 dile , . and was most probably brought from the 

 island of Cuba : the ships which are engaged in trade 

 with the negroes on the coast of Congo frequently visit 

 tuba: so that it is not at all unlikely that the specimen 

 iroughl from that island. 



2. Palinia ? Moreletii. (Yucatan Palinia.) 



Crocodilus Moreletii. Bum. Arch, du Mus. vi. p. 255, t. 20 ; 

 Kept. p. 28. n. 5*. 

 s much, Croc. p. 42. 

 Palinia'.' Moreletii. Gray, Ann. $Mag. Nat. Hist. 3rd ser. 

 x. p. 271 ; Trans. Zool. Soc. 1869, vi. p. 146. 



Dorsal soales keeled, nearly Bquare; scales of the sides 

 and limbs smooth, without tubercles. 



Hah. Yucatan ; l.ac Florea (.1/. Moreht). 



This -.pedes is described from a Bpeoimen in the Museum 

 of Paris, which is Aery badly figured and indistinctly de- 

 soribed in the memoir above cited. 



There are two young specimens of Crocodiles, in spirit, 

 without habitats, in the British Museum, which are pecu- 

 liar in the large size of the nuchal shield, the strength of 

 the keels of the dorsal shields, and the large keeled scales 

 of the forearms and thighs, in which they agree with 

 Palinia rhombifera; but there is so much difference be- 

 tween the two, and between each of them and the specimens 

 of that species from Cuba, that I think they must ho left 

 in doubt for further elucidation. There are also two small 

 stuffed specimens in the collection (purchased of dealers, 

 but without any locality attached), which are peculiar in 

 having six series of uniform, squarish, very strongly keeled 

 dorsal scales ; they are very uuliko any other specimen in 

 the collection, and may be new ; but I do not like to de- 

 scribe them in the present imperfect state of our know- 

 ledge. 



b. The intermaxillary hone elongate, produced and truncated 

 behind; the sutures sloping backwards and converging, 

 and then transverse or sinuous. Toes webbed. Legs 

 with a fringe of elongated triangidar scales. 



4. CROCODILUS. 



Face oblong, depressed, without any ridge in front of the 

 orbits. Nuchal shields four, in an arched series. Cervical 

 disk rhombic, of six shields. Dorsal plates quadrilateral, 

 as broad as long ; the vertebral series rather the widest 

 and most keeled. Intermaxillary produced behind. 



Crocodilus, Gray, Ann. 6r Mag. Nat. Hist. 3rd ser. x. p. 271 ; 

 Trans. Zool. Soc. 1869, vi. p. 146. 



" The Crocodiles live on the mud-banks or swimming 

 about the rivers " of Africa. 



Dr. Balfour Baikie observes : — " The ninth upper tooth 

 of Crocodiles is said to be enlarged like a canine ; but this 

 is not correct. I have examined the dentition of eighteen 

 skulls of various species : in the lower jaw there are always 

 nineteen teeth ; but in the upper jaw the number in the 

 adult is seventeen on either side, while in the young it is 

 eighteen. This is owing to the second incisor being deci- 

 duous ; and in old skulls the socket is completely obliterated 



