2 ON THE SKULL OF TARSIPES ROSTRATUS. 
In the occipital region, the supra-occipital is rather small and rounded; the 
sutures are apparent between the various occipital elements; the foramen magnum 
is very large; the condyles are small, lateral, and far apart. 
The premaxille are moderately large, but their ascending processes, which 
never in Marsupials reach the frontals, go here a very short way indeed. The 
slender, delicate jugal extends backwards as in other Marsupials to the glenoid 
region. The facial plate of the lachrymal, usually large in Marsupials, is here very 
markedly so, coming into relation with the frontal, nasal, maxillary, and jugal 
bones. The lachrymal canal is, as usual, external to the orbit. Neither zygoma 
nor frontal bones bear any trace of post-orbital processes. 
The hard palate is formed in front for a short distance by the premazille, 
which send inwards and backwards long slender palatine processes (always large in 
Marsupials), between which the septum nasi appears for a short distance in front. 
Posteriorly their pointed ends slightly overlap the palatine plates of the maxillaries, 
which are deeply notched, to form the anterior palatine foramina; these last, 
above which lie the large Jacobson’s organs, are extremely large, as long as the 
whole premaxillary bones. The palatine plates of the maxillaries are again deeply 
notched behind, and into these notches fit the palatine bones. The latter are thin, 
sub-convex, spatulate plates, which become very thin and narrow posteriorly. The 
wide space between them is in part occupied by two independent bones, thin and 
slender, the inter-palatines ; these may possibly have become separate by absorption, 
but I have noted their presence and independent origin in certain Phalangistidee. 
The pterygoids are less than half the length of the palatines ; they reach from 
the posterior extremity of the palatines to far back below the squamosal, and 
possess a lamular process in the form of a very delicate hook. Just behind the 
pterygoids, on the inner side of a narrow isthmus connecting the main portion of 
the alisphenoid with the tympanic bulla, is a rounded notch for the Eustachian 
tube. On removing the inter-palatines, the posterior end of the narrow vomer 
comes into view. 
The squamosal is very large, and, thrust downwards by the great parietal, is 
visible to as great an extent upon the floor as on the side-wall of the skull. The 
zygomatic process is very short and pointed. Between the upper border of the 
squamosal and parietal is a narrow lanceolate fontanelle, in the hinder part of which 
lies a small intercalary ossicle such as I have figured in Microgale (Phil. Trans. 
1885, pl. 35), and have there ventured to call a swpratemporal. This hollow shell 
of the squamosal abuts behind upon the auditory meatus, and forms in front of and 
above that passage a large oblique crescent, vaulted and pneumatic within, mimetic 
of, and ancillary to, the true tympanic ring which lies below. 
Behind the auditory meatus a large portion of the squamosal appears externally 
as a broad surface of bone between the parietal, the interparietal, the occipital, and 
the tympanic bulla. The large vaulted tympanic bulla is constituted of several 
