452 FEATHERED ARCII.EOPTERYX OF THE OOLITE, chap. xxii. 



and of do\Yn on the body. The veins and shafts of the fea- 

 thers can be seen by the naked eye. Fourteen long quill- 

 feathers diverge on each side of the metacarpal and phalangiul 

 bones, and decrease in length from six inches to one inch. 

 The wings have a general resemblance to those of gallinaceous 

 birds. The tarso-metatarsal, or drumstick, exhibits at its 

 distal end a trifid articular surface supporting three toes, as 

 in birds. The furculum, pelvis, and bones of the tail are iu 

 their natural position. The tail consists of twenty vertebrae, 

 each of which supports a pair of plumes. The length of the 

 tail with its feathers is eleven and a half inches, and its 

 breadth three and a half. It is obtusely truncated at the 

 end. In all living birds the tail-feathers are arranged in 

 fan-shaped order and attached to a coccygean bone, consist- 

 ing of several vertebrae united together, whei'cas in the em- 

 bryo state these same vertebrae are distinct. The greatest 

 number is seen in the ostrich, which has eighteen caudal ver- 

 tebrae in the fcetal state, which are reduced to nine in the adult 

 bird, many of them having been anchylosed together. Pro- 

 fessor Owen therefore considers the tail of the Archgeopteryx 

 as exemplifying the persistency of what is now an embryonic 

 character. The tail, he remarks, is essentiall}^ a variable 

 character. There are long-tailed bats and short-tailed bats, 

 long-tailed rodents and short-tailed rodents, long-tailed ptero- 

 dactyls and short-tailed pterodactyls. 



The Archffiopteryx differs from all known birds, not only in 

 the structure of its tail, but in having two, if not three, digits 

 in the hand ; but there is no trace of the fifth digit of the 

 winged reptile. 



The conditions under Avhich the skeleton occurs are such, 

 says Professor Owen, as to remind us of the carcass of a gull 

 which had been a prey to some Carnivore, which had re- 

 moved all the soft parts, and perhaps the head, nothing 

 being left but the bony legs and the indigestible quill- 



