62 Zoological Society. 



white ; chest sulphur-yellow, bounded below by a band of rich deep 

 scarlet ; upper tail-coverts sulphur-yellow ; under tail-coverts rich 

 deep scarlet. 



Total length, 21 inches; bill, 5^; wing, 8^ ; tail, 7i ; tarsi. If. 

 Hab. Santa Fe de Bogota. 



In the collection of Prince Massena at Paris, and in my own. 



Pteroglossus pcecilosternus. Pt. culmine rostri, strigd angustd 



ad basim mandibulce superioris ; sic et mandibuld inferiore totd 



nigerrimis ; mandibulis utrisque ad basim lined prominente angustd 



aiirantiacd circumdatis ; mandibulae superioris lateribus belle au- 



rantiacis ; capite et guld splendide nigerrimis ; dorso, alis cau- 



ddque saturate viridi-olivaceis ; corpore inferiore sulphureo, vittd 



jjectorali nigrd, alterd sanguined. 



Culmen, a narrow band down the base of the upper mandible and 



the whole of the under mandible deep black; narrow elevated ridge 



surrounding the base of both mandibles orange ; sides of the upper 



mandible beautiful orange, fading into white towards the tip, which 



is stained Avith red ; head and throat deep glossy black ; back, wings 



and tail dark olive-green ; rump and upper tail-coverts rich deep 



blood-red; all the under surface sulphur-yellow, crossed on the chest 



by an irregular band of black, and on the breast by another of deep 



blood-red ; the interspaces stained with scarlet ; thighs chestnut, each 



feather slightly fringed with sulphur-yellow. 



Total length, 18 inches; bill, 4^; wing, 6; tail, 7^; tarsi. If. 



Hab. Santa Fe de Bogota. 



In the collection of Prince Massena at Paris. 



Professor Owen read a communication on the Rudimental Mar- 

 supial Bones in the Thylacinus : — 



The marsupial bones, as bones, do not exist in the Dog-headed 

 Opossum or Hyaena of the Tasmanian colonists {Thylacinus Harrisii, 

 Teram.) ; they are represented by two small, oblong, flattened fibro- 

 cartilages, imbedded in the internal pillars of the abdominal rings, 

 and appear each as a thickened part of the tendon of the external 

 oblique abdominal muscle, which forms the above pillar. The length 

 of the marsupial fibro- cartilage is six lines, its breadth from three 

 to four lines, its thickness one line and a half. 



This was the condition of the rudimental marsupial bones in two 

 full-grown females and one male specimen of the Thylacinus : in a 

 fourth large and old male a few particles of the bone-salts were de- 

 posited in the centre of the fibro-cartilage, occasioning a gritty feel- 

 ing when cut across by the knife. 



This unexpected and very remarkable modification of the most 

 characteristic part of the skeleton of the Marsupialia, in one of the 

 largest of that order, has many important bearings upon the physio- 

 logy of the problematical ' ossa marsupialia.' They have been most 

 commonly supposed to serve for the support of the marsupial pouch 

 and young ; but this pouch is well developed in the female Thylacine, 

 and in one of the specimens which I dissected four well- developed 

 teats, each two inches long, indicated that it had contained four 



