98 REPORT—1858. 
Buckland of the fragment of a jaw found in the same lias at Lyme Regis, with similar 
minute serial teeth, “‘ like one another, flat, and shaped at the point like a lancet,” 
and which he believed was ‘‘ probably that of our Pterodactyle,”” was deemed by 
most palzontologists to have been rather a portion of the jaw of a fish. The Pée- 
rodactylus Banthensis and Pterodactylus Gemmingi, distinguished by an edentulous 
production (processus mentalis), from the fore-part of the jaw, had three or four large 
teeth next behind that process, followed by several smaller teeth; and these Ptero- 
dactyles formed the genus Ramphorhynchus of V. Meyer: but the hind-teeth were 
not nearly so numerous and minute as in the specimen from the lower lias, and this 
had no edentulous ‘ processus mentalis.”” So marked a difference from the dentition 
of the species of the true Péerodactylus, represented by Péer. longirostris and Péer. 
crassirostris, as well as from the mandibular and dental characters of the Rampho- 
rhynchus of V. Meyer, appeared to call for the subgeneric separation of the Péer. 
macronyx of Buckland from the later forms of Péerosawria : and Professor Owen pro- 
posed the name Dimorphodon for this new subgenus, in reference to the two kinds 
of teeth, or two features of dentition, one of them borrowed, as it were, from the 
fish or batrachian, by this early form of flying dragon.’ Among the bones associated 
with the skull, the author defined the lower half of a radius and ulna; four metacar- 
pals, including the very thick and strong one of the wing-finger; the first, second, 
and great part of the third phalanges of that finger; phalanges, including two un- 
equal ones, of the short claw-bearing fingers; portions of the radius and ulna, and 
the entire metacarpal of the wing-finger of the other fore-limb; a few vertebre and 
ribs. Only three of these bones could be compared with the first specimen of a 
Pterodactyle from Lyme Regis, described by Dr. Buckland: their respective lengths 
were as follows :— 
Pierodactylus (Dimorphodon) macronyx. 
Ist Specimen. 2nd Specimen. 
in. lines. in. lines. 
Length of metacarpal of fifth or wing-finger....... ae BB abe 8 
Length of first phalanx of fifth or wing-finger....... 3 9 ans «= 6 
Length of second phalanx of fifth or wing-finger...... 4 9 oreect 4 9 
Length of a claw-phalanx........, AMOI TL ORO Hod B O-.. 82  ssteay Oy 9 
By this comparison it was shown that the second specimen was larger than the first, 
but differed so slightly in the proportions of the first and second phalanges, as not, 
in Professor Owen’s opinion, to justify a distinction of species: more particularly 
since, on the supposition of the portion of jaw figured by Dr. Buckland having be- 
longed to the same individual as the limb-bones figured by the same author, the first 
specimen of Pterodactylus macronyx had the same subgeneric character of mandibular 
teeth as the second specimen from the same formation and locality. 
Some portions of thin-walled hollow bones from the upper beds of the Trias of 
Wirtemberg might belong to the Pterodactyle genus; in which case they would in- 
dicate the oldest examples known of the flying order of reptiles. The oldest cer- 
tainly known Pterodactyles were, at present, the Pterodac/ylus macronyz, Bd., of the 
lower lias, forming the type of the subgenus Dimorphodon; and bones of Pterodac- 
tyle from the coeval lias in Wirtemberg. The next in point of age was the Pt. Ban- 
thensis, from the ‘ Posidonomyenschiefer’ of Banz, in Bavaria, answering to the alum- 
shale of our Whitby lias. ‘Then follows the Péter. Bucklandi, from the Stonesfield 
oolite. Above this came the first-defined and numerous species of Pterodactyle from 
the lithographic slates of the Middle Oolitic system; as at Solenhofen, Pappenheim, 
and Nusplingen, in Germany, and from Cirin, on the Rhine. The Pterodactyles of 
the Wealden were, as yet, known by only a few bones and bone-fragments; as had 
hitherto been also those of the ‘ Greensand’ of Cambridgeshire. Finally, the Ptero- 
dactyles of the Middle Chalk of Kent, so remarkable for their great size, constituted 
the last forms of flying reptiles known in the history of the crust of this earth. 
On Remains of New and Gigantic Species of Pterodactyle (Pter. Fittoni and 
Pter. Sedgwickii) from the Upper Greensand, near Cambridge. By Pro- 
fessor Owren, W.D., LL.D., F.R.S. 
Professor Owen communicated the results of an examination of an extensive series 
ae 
