OF RECENT CROCODILIANS. 127 
and facts requiring verification, when the old and the newly acquired specimens are 
submitted to a-reexamination and study. It is this experience that makes me inclined to 
place less reliance than other naturalists upon essays prepared by persons who come and 
look at a series of specimens for the first time, and describe them offhand. Yet such 
works are often regarded as of authority, very often on account of their length, or the 
beautiful manner in which they are printed or illustrated. 
The references to the catalogue of the osteological specimens in the College of 
‘Surgeons are based on the examination of the specimens in that collection; and I have 
to thank the Council of the College for their permission to examine them, and Mr. 
Flower, the energetic Curator of the collection, for his kindness and assistance in 
determining them. 
If any evidence were required of the difficulties of determining the species of this 
family, I need only refer to the nomenclature of the skull in the catalogue above 
referred to, which was prepared by the late Curator of the collection, Professor Owen. 
In this collection, for example, I found what I consider to be three distinct species 
in one case, and two distinct species in another, confounded under the same name; and 
on the other hand, I found what I regard as skulls of the same species inserted under 
three different names. 
The skull of a Crocodile which is found in the internal rivers ‘of India, is named 
Crocodilus rhombifer, Cuvier (which isan American species), though the specimen in the 
College Museum was received from Bengal. 
I do not by any means regard my determination of these skulls as infallible; but I 
have taken every care to make it correct by repeated examination. I first arranged 
the skulls as they appeared to be alike, according to the characters here assigned to 
them, without paying any attention to the names given, placing them in order according 
as the size showed the change in the growth; and Mr, Flower, Mr. Gerrard, and some 
other zoologists who are used to the examination of bones, agree with me in my 
determination, and were much interested in observing how gradually the skulls of 
different ages glided into each other’. 
I must observe, if there is this difference of opinion in the determination of skulls of 
recent Crocodiles, where the series of skulls for different-aged animals can be compared, 
and where the skulls are in a perfect state, how much more difficult it must be to have 
confidence in the determination of the skull of the fossil, or some fossil species where 
the skulls are generally more or less imperfect, and perhaps only single specimens 
(often very imperfect specimens) have been examined! 
‘ The following is the result of my examinations of the specimens of Crocodiles in the Museum of the College 
of Surgeons (the numbers refer to the numbers in the catalogue) :— : 
682-707. Gavialis gangeticus=Gavialis, 
710. Crocodilus cataphractus = Mecistops cataphractus, the type specimen. 
711, 712, 714, 716. Crocodilus acutus=Molinia americana, from America. 
