281 



processes of the vertebrae ; the six anterior vertebree, with large ribs at- 

 tached to them, and three ribs at the end of the stone, the vertebrae 

 belonging to which are broken off. The live vertebrae next., to those 

 which are connected with the ribs, he remarks, have large transverse 

 processes, whilst those of the next four are small. The ilia are situated 

 after these four; but he is of opinion that they have been displaced, and 

 that they should have been found behind the five vertebrae with large 

 transverse processes, which he considers as vertebras of the loins. The 

 impressions of the ossa ilia were supposed by Stukeley to have been of 

 the thigh-bones ; and two large and short impressions near them, which 

 M. Cuvier is unable to refer to any particular bones, he considered as the 

 heads of the tibia and fibula. No marks of the head existing in this fossil, 

 and the vertebrae not having been figured with precision, no conjectures 

 can be offered with respect to the species. 



Captain William Chapman, in the fiftieth volume of the Philoso- 

 phical Transactions, p. 688, gives an account of the finding, on the sea- 

 shore, about half a mile from Whitby, part of the bones of an animal 

 appearing to have been an alligator. They were found in a kind of 

 black slate, which had been covered five or six feet with water every 

 full sea, and were about nine or ten yards from the cliff, which is 

 nearly perpendicular, and about sixty yards high, and is continually 

 wearing away by the washing of the sea against it. The place where 

 these bones lay was frequently covered with sea-sand to the depth of 

 two feet. 



Mr. Woollers, p. 786, of the same volume, gives a further account of 

 the foregoing fossil skeleton. He says : " In this same rock, ammonitge, 

 or snake-stones, as they are called, are found. The animal, when living, 

 must have been twelve or fourteen feet long. It lay six yards from the 

 foot of the cliff, which is sixty yards in perpendicular height, and must 

 have been covered by it, probably, not much more than a century ago. 

 The cliff there is composed of various strata, beginning from the top of 

 earth, clay, marie, and stones, of various thicknesses, till it comes to 



VOL. III. O O 



