188 MR. PARKER ON THE SKULI. OF CHAMELEONS. [Mar. 16, 



the type specimen in the British Museum that he had heen able to 

 identify the form. He hoped to be able ere long to give a full account 

 of its structure. 



Mr. W. A. Forbes, F.Z.S., Prosector to the Society, read a 

 description of the male generative organs of the Sumatran Rhino- 

 ceros {Rhinoceros sumatrensis), as observed in an adult male specimen 

 which died in the Society's Gardens in 1879. 



This paper will be pubhshed in the Society's ' Transactions.' 



Mr. W. K. Parker read the following abstract of a memoir on the 

 structure of the skull iu the Chameleons : — 



" I have worked out the skull in the adult and newly-hatched 

 young of Chamceleo vulgaris and in the adult of C. pumilus. The 

 results satisfy me that the Chameleons are a very isolated group, far 

 further removed from the ordinary Lacertilia than even the New- 

 Zealand Hatteria (or Sphenodon). 



"Their skull is extremely ornate, and greatly developed upwards 

 and behind by the breaking up of the parietal region into three bones, 

 the middle piece becoming the large arched crest. 



" They have no ' epifterygoidean columella,' only one vomer, an 

 abortively developed single premaxillary, an arrested auditory appa- 

 ratus, with no drum-cavity, no cochlea, and no fenestra rotunda. 

 The basihyal is as long as the skull and highly ossified ; the 

 teeth are all ankylosed to the upper and lower jaws. These, and 

 many other things, show that these Lizards require to be kept at a 

 great distance (zoologically) from all the other groups. 



"By comparing the skulls of the new-born Chameleon, of the adult 

 of the Dwarf Chameleon, and of the adult of the Common Chameleon 

 with those of other Lizards, especially of the typical genus Lacerta, 

 I have been able to understand the modifications that have taken 

 place in this most extraordinary type, in the skull of which I have 

 counted as many as twenty-five modifications of structure as com- 

 pared with what is normal in the Lacertilia. 



" A species of Iguanoid from Mexico, viz. Lcemanotus longipes, 

 has a very small and greatly crested skull, which gives this Lizard a 

 very Chameleonoid appearance. This skull, with that of the less- 

 modified Dwarf Chameleon, has helped me greatly. 



" The skull of the newly hatched young of the typical Chameleon 

 comes very near that of the young of any other kind of Lizard in 

 the condition of its roof-bones — the parts that become so transformed 

 afterwards ; and in passing from it to the skull of the adult, I have 

 been glad to lay down any stepping-stones I could find. 



" At some future time I hope to give the morphology of the skull 

 in Lcemanotus and in Hatteria." 



This paper will be published entire in the Society's 'Transactions.* 



The following papers were read : — 



