54 C. R. Eastman — Fossil Bird and Fish Remains 



only complaint is that he cannot get enough of it. What he most oT 

 all desires, and what his patient labour deserves, is that his work 

 should be subjected to a searching examination. But until hia 

 conclusions are proved to be wrong, we may fairly claim a wide 

 toleration for whatever views on the physics of the earth's crust 

 seem to us most nearly in accordance with the nature of geological 

 phenomena. 



Some time or other, no doubt, Mr. Fisher's chief life-work will 

 be weighed in the balance. Whether it be found wanting or not, 

 no one will dispute that he has solved one problem with complete 

 success. However bitterly he may have been attacked, his courtesy 

 has never failed. He is one of the few men whose part in 

 controversy has enriched, and never degraded, science. He can 

 look back upon a long life of fruitful labour and of kindly service 

 to his fellow-men. At the same time he can reflect that he has never 

 written a harsh word that he could now wish to be withdrawn. 



C. Davison. 



11. — New Fossil Bird and Fish Remains from the Middle 

 Eocene of Wyoming. 



By Charles E. Eastman, Cambridge, Mass. 



(PLATE IV.) 



/ rriHE Green Eiver Shales of Wyoming have long been noted for their 



"^ JL numerous and beautifully preserved fossil fishes. Fragmentary 



traces of bird-remains have been met with in the same horizon from 



time to time since the year 1869, when the first fossil feather 



reported from North America was obtained by Dr. F. V. Hayden.' 



During the past summer the Museum of Comparative Zoology 

 at Cambridge, Massachusetts, has come into possession of two 

 remarkable specimens from the fish-bearing shales near Fossil, 

 Wyoming. One of these is a gigantic Lepidosteid, of which only 

 detached scales and vertebra9 have hitherto been known ; the other 

 is a nearly perfect skeleton of a gallinaceous bird. It is the writer's 

 intention to present a detailed description of both fossils at some 

 future time, but meanwhile it is possible the following notes may 

 be of interest. 



Gallinuloides Wyomingensis, gen. et sp. nov. (Plate IV.) 



Short-billed, stout-legged birds attaining the size of a gallinule,. 

 rail, or small coot, and resembling these forms in general characters. 

 Coracoid straight and stout, without subclavicular process ; furculuni 

 V-shaped, with well-developed hypocleidium. Wings short, bones 

 of hind-limb of medium length. Femur one-fifth and tibia rather 

 more than two-thirds longer than the tarso-metatarsus. The latter 

 is flattened from back to front, has moderately expanded extremities, 

 and a deep anterior channel occupying nearly the total length, which 

 in the type measures 34 mm. ; second trochlea slightly shorter thaa 

 the fourth, and not produced towards the inner side. Lateral toes 



^ Amer. Joum. Sci. [3], vol. xi (1870), p. 272. 



