626 R. W. SHUFELDT 



The skull. — ^As already pointed out above, this part of the skele- 

 ton has been rendered almost useless through the scraping given it 

 by the collector. Still, there is something to be said of it, for even 

 its outline teaches a little, though in regard to this. Dr. Eastman 

 made no comments whatever, beyond deploring the mutilations 

 which have been committed. 



Taken in connection with the mandible, the form of the skull of 

 this fossil bird was distinctly of the gallinaceous type, which will 

 be readily appreciated by comparing it with that of any true and 

 average grouse, partridge, or pheasant. Several of these are shown 

 in previous papers of mine (see footnote i). In general, the 

 characters are the same in all of these. In the specimen under 

 consideration, the external narial aperture was of moderate size, 

 and possessed the usual elliptical outline; the quadrato-jugal bar 

 was slender and straight, while the postfrontal and squamosal 

 processes were united at their anterior apices as in Bonasa. A 

 lacrymal bone was of some size, and had a form such as we see in 

 Phasianus colchius,^ while a nasal beyond it closely resembles that 

 element of the cranium in any average tetraonid that has its maxil- 

 lary process narrow and delicately formed. 



There is a good character in the antero-terminal portion of the 

 superior maxillary or upper mandible, for it has a contour that is 

 strictly gallinaceous in all respects,^ and is essentially quite different 

 from anything of the kind we find either in the rails or in gallinules. 



Vertebral column. — ^There were fifteen vertebrae in the cervical 

 division of the spine before we come to one which is considered to 

 be the first dorsal vertebra, as it has a pair of true ribs connecting 

 with the sternum by means of costal ribs. This is the sixteenth 

 of the spine, and its ribs and the connecting costal ribs or haema- 

 pophyses can easily be made out in the specimen. Whether the 

 fifteenth bore a small pair of free ribs cannot be stated positively, 

 as they are not in sight in that vertebra. 



' R. W. Shufeldt, "Osteology of Birds," State Museum Bull. 130, N.Y. State 

 Museum, Albany, 1909, Gallinae, PI. 2, Fig. 18. 



^ R. W. Shufeldt, "Observations upon the Morphology of Callus bankiva of 

 India,," Jour. Comp. Med. and Stirg., New York, July, 1888, Vol. IX, No. 4, art. 21, pp. 

 343-76, 30 figures in text (pmx.). 



