THE 



GEOLOGICAL MAGAZINE. 



No. XXXrV.— APRIL, 1867. 



Oiai<3-IIsr.A.Xi -A-iaTICXiIES^ 



I, — .<0» THE OCCUBBENCE OF THE GeNUS SqUALODON IN THE 



Tektiary Strata of Victoria. 



By Frederick M'Cot, F.G.S. 



PrtifeBSor of Natural Sciences in the University of Melbourne, and Palseontologist to 

 the Geological Survey of Victoria. 



(PLATE VIII. Fig. 1.) 



AS confirmatory of the Miocene age assigned by me, on other 

 palseontological grounds, to the Tertiary sands on the Southern 

 shores of Victoria, containing the Trigonia semiundklata (M'Coy),^ 

 I think the accompanying figure (Plate VIII., Fig. 1), of the natural 

 size, of a molar of an Australian species of the mammaKan genus 

 Squalodon, may be of interest. 



The species is smaller than any of the American Eocene Zeuglo- 

 donts, or the Maltese Miocene Squalodon Melitensis, and it difiers 

 from them all in the great proportions, length (or depth), and 

 imperfect bifurcation of the root. In the latter,' and all other 

 characters, it most nearly agrees with the Squalodon Grateloupi of 

 von Meyer, from the French Miocene beds near Bordeaux. 



The specimen figured was found by Mr. Wilkinson in the sandy 

 Miocene Tertiary beds of Castle Cove, Cape Otway, coast of Victoria, 

 and is now in the National Museum at Melbourne. I have great 

 pleasure in. naming this important fossil after that zealous young 

 geologist, attached to the field-branch of the Geological Survey of 

 this colony. 



Squalodon WilMnsoni, (M'Coy). 



Description of Specimen. — One of the molars having a com- 

 pressed semi-elliptical crown, 9 lines high, base 11 Iraes, and 

 5^ lines thick ; length of bilobed root 1 inch 9 lines ; middle 

 cusp bent moderately backwards ; anterior convex edge irregu- 

 larly serrated and divided into two unequal cusps, the smaller 

 about one-third from the top of that edge, the larger at about one- 

 third from th'fe bottom ; posterior shorter edge divided almost equally 

 , into three large cusps, the lowest smallest, the two upper nearly equal, 

 and much larger, being about half the width of the middle cusp. 

 Surface longitudinally marked with coarse, rough, very irregular 

 sulci, and small granular, angular ridges, and strias. Koot bilobed 

 below the upper half inch, with incurved end. 



1 See Geol. Mag., Vol. III., No. xxix., November, 1866, p. 481. 



VOL. IT. — NO. XXXIV. 10 



