MR. W. K. PARKER ON THE OSTEOLOGY OF BAL^NICEPS REX. 295 



maxillary : the whole sweep of the broad and massive ridge, from the wide but anteriorly 

 scanted sphenoido-frontals to the end of the great hooked beak, belongs to it, and 

 much of the dentary margin; the extreme posterior angle is, however, evidently maxillary 

 ia its origin. Nor can it be said that the lacrymals and nasals have come 



" cranking in. 



And cnt it from the best of all its land, 



A huge half moon, a monstrous cantle out ;" 



for the lacrymals, although actually of good size, form but a narrow crescentic strip 

 down the orbital margin ; while the so-called ' nasals ' have relatively but a small ' lot,' 

 and that all shot into strips and angles. We shall see, moreover, that the pre-maxiUary 

 has the hard palate almost entirely to itself, the broad palatines overlapping a little 

 behind ; whilst the spongy ethmoidal pterapophyses run forward between and in front 

 of the palatines, nearly filling up that postero-mesial space which, in many birds, is 

 principally composed of membrane. Seen in profile, the dorsal ridge of the Cancroma 

 is convex in its whole extent: but in Balteniceps the rise into the rough boss in front 

 of the hinge is rather sudden, the dorsal line in front of the boss descending very gently 

 to the middle; then rising again as gently as it descended, it gradually becomes the 

 tipper outline of the great terminal beak. The ' dip ' of the dorsal outline is rather 

 more than four lines. 



The length of the upper jaw of Balfeniceps (not measured along the curve, but in a 

 straight line) is rather more than 7 inches, its broadest part, a little behind the middle, 

 being nearly 3 inches. The same measurements in Cancroma are 3 inches, and 1 inch 

 8 lines. In the Adjutant the widest part is at the zygoma, which is 2 inches 2 lines, 

 its length being 13 inches; and in the Pelican the length is 15 inches and 6 lines, 

 and the broadest part (near the anterior fourth) is rather more than 1 inch 6 lines. 

 Thus we see that in the elegant, broad pre-maxilla of the Boat-bill the breadth is more 

 than half the length (its shape being like that of the distal two-thirds of the leaf of 

 Magnolia grandijlora) ; that of the ' Whale-head ' is more than twice as long as it is 

 broad. If, however, the latter were less arched, its width would be relatively as great 

 as that of its small relation. Drawing a basal line from margin to margin of the prae- 

 maxilla, we find its palatine concavity to be 1 inch 2 lines high ; this most hollowed 

 part being one-fourth from its hinder margin, from which part the bony plate descends 

 rather rapidly to join the palatines. The greatest concavity of the hard palate is more 

 anterior in the Boat-bill, and it is two-fifths of an inch high ; whilst the greatest height 

 in the Adjutant is two-thirds of an inch, at one-fifth of the whole length from the 

 posterior angle. 



The ' hard palate ' in the prse-maxilla of the Pelican is very flat between the great 

 internal ridges, and, in some respects, the upper jaw of this bird has more resemblance 

 to that of the Flamingo, save for the strange bend in the latter, than to the same part 



in the Balseniceps. 



2t2 



