^ The Zoologist— April, 1869. 1617 



Collected Observations on British Reptiles. 

 By Edward Newman. 



(Continued from S. S. 1598.) 



Order II. Crocodiles (Loricata). 



Are covered with a very hard dermal envelope, which, on the back, 

 is divided into departments or sections, each containing a somewhat 

 square spongy bone firmly embedded in the skin, and forming part of 

 the shield-like armature which has given rise to the name of Loricata. 

 My late friend, Edward Doubleday, when in the United States, was at 

 first puzzled with these cuirious substances : they were extremely 

 numerous at a little bend of the river St. Johns, just below the town 

 of Jacksonville in east Florida, but he soon found that they were the 

 dermal bones of alligators, that had either died of a ripe old age — 

 " exactis non infeliciter annis," or had fallen victims to the rifles of the 

 militia and other troops constantly passing up and down the river in 

 the steamers. The sections or divisions of the dermal envelope are 

 generally furnished with a keel-like projection more or less developed, 

 and these, being arranged in dorsal and caudal series, form long 

 toothed crests, each series having somewhat the appearance of a 

 gigantic saw. The legs are short and strong ; the fore feet have five 

 toes, and the hind feet four ; the toes are usually connected by a 

 swimming membrane ; the head is long, and each jaw is furnished with 

 a single row of deciduous teeth, which are renewed by new ones being 

 formed within the base of the old, and pushing these out of their 

 places: the lower jaw extends backwards beyond the skull, so that 

 when the mouth is opened the upper jaw appears to be articulated 

 and moveable as in parrots — but this is not the case; the upper jaw 

 really forms an integral and very principal part of the skull ; the 

 tongue is fleshy and fixed in the recess between the branches of the 

 lower jaw, not moveable and extensile as in endosteate animals 

 generally. These creatures are strictly carnivorous ; they inhabit the 

 rivers of Asia, Africa, and America, and grow to an enormous size — 

 sometimes, it is said, attaining a length of twenty-five feet, but I have- 

 never seen such in museums. None now inhabit Europe ; indeed, 

 the number of Loricata is everywhere diminishing : these huge 

 reptiles are too powerful to amalgamate with Teutonic man ; it is 

 impossible for any community of interest to exist between him and 



SECOND SERIES — VOL. IV. S 



