102 CLASS KEPTILIA. 



The CiiocoDiLEs (properly so called),* 



Have the muzzle oblong and depressed j the teeth 

 uneven, the fourth below passing into notches, and 

 not into holes, in the upper jaw, and all the other 

 characters of the gavials. There are species of this 

 form in both Continents. 



The Common Crocodile, or that of the Nile. (Lac. 

 Crocodilus. L.) Geoff. Des. de I'Eg. Rept. ii. 1. 

 Ann. Mus. X. iii. 1. Cuv. ihid. X. pi. 1. f 5. and 

 ii. f. 7 ; and Oss. Foss. V., part 2, same plate 

 and fig. 



So celebrated among the ancients, has six ranges of 

 square plates, pretty nearly equal, along the back.t 



places J and I have marked the points in which the osteology of their cra- 

 nium differs from that of the existing gavial. — See my " Recherches sur 

 les Oss. Foss." V. 2d part. Analogous observations have also been made 

 in England by Mr. Conybeare. From these differences, which principally 

 attach to the hinder part of the palate, M. Geoffroy has thought proper to 

 make two genera of these last animals, which he names Theleosaurus 

 and Steneosaurus ; and nevertheless he seems to think that the present 

 gavials may descend from them, and that the differences may result from 

 the change of atmospheric circumstances.— Mem. du Mus. XII. 



* Kf oxoSeiXo?, that which fears the shore — a name given by the Greeks to a 

 lizard common among themselves. They afterwards applied it, on the 

 score of resemblance, to the crocodile of Egypt, when they travelled into 

 this latter country. — Herodot. lib. ii, M. Merrem has changed the name 

 of this sub-genus into Champses, v/hich, according to Herodotus, was 

 the Egyptian name of this animal. 



f There are found, from Senegal as far as the Ganges and beyond it, 

 some crocodiles very similar to the common, some of which have the 



