218 REPTILIA. 



of preservation. Parasuchus is the name of fragments from 

 the Gondwana Formation of Maleri, Central Provinces, India. 



Belodon (fig. 135). The skull of Belodon is marked by a pitted and 

 rugose ornament, and the snout is much produced, not by the elonga- 

 tion of the whole facial region, but by the enormous development of the 

 premaxillse. There is no pineal foramen, and the orbits are directed 

 upwards; the supratemporal vacuities are extremely small, and the 

 lateral temporal vacuities are large. An extensive antorbital vacuity 

 is conspicuous, and the external uares are paired. Neither of the eu- 

 stachian passages is enclosed by bone; while the palatines and ptery- 

 goids do not develop secondary plates to displace the actual primitive 

 opening of the posterior nares. There is a vacuity in the hinder half 

 of the mandibular rarnus. The vertebrae are amphicrelous, and only 

 two are comprised in the sacrum. The coracoid is short and rounded, 

 with a very large fontanelle ; and clavicular elements seem to have been 

 present. The pubis enters the acetabulum, which seems to have been 

 completely closed. The dorsal armour comprises a symmetrical pair of 

 large, overlapping, keeled scutes, ornamented like those of modern croco- 

 diles ; and there was probably a ventral armour of smaller, more irregular 

 scutes. The typical species is Belodon kapffi, with a skull attaining a 

 length of at least O7 m. 



Sub-Order 2. Mesosuchia. 



These are the Jurassic crocodiles, all except the latest 

 adapted for an exclusively aquatic life. As already remarked, 

 they are distinguished from the typical Cretaceous and modern 

 families by the characters of the palate, eustachian passages, 

 and vertebral centra; but they never exhibit more than two 

 sacral vertebras. Their remains are known only from Europe, 

 Madagascar, South America, and perhaps North America. 



It has been suggested that the appearance of the broad- 

 iiosed genera in the Purbeck and Wealden is correlated with 

 the in-coming of warm-blooded prey, whether mammalian or 

 avian. It is, at any rate, curious, that dwarf crocodiles of 

 this kind (Theriosuchus, Nannosuchus) are associated with the 

 remains of diminutive mammals in a stratum of the Purbeck 

 Beds near Swanage. 



Pelagosaurus (fig. 136). This genus is known by nearly complete 

 skeletons from the Upper Lias of Wurtemberg, Normandy, Yorkshire, 

 and Somersetshire. The skull is much elongated and narrow, with 



