500 Arthur Smith Woodward — British Fossil Crocodilia. 



long ago,^ published a most elaborate study of its specific variations, 

 he appears to have left the wider question of its affinities altogether 

 i;ntouched. The latter palseontologist endeavours to show that all 

 the specimens hitherto described really belong to a single species, 

 divisible into two varieties, one English and one German ; and he 

 accordingly proposes {loc. cit. p. 83) to apply the name of M. 

 ShilceJyi^ to both, with the varietal adjunct of Chapmani, in the case 

 of the first, and Bollensis in that of the second. But the ordinary 

 rules of priority in nomenclature render it doubtful whether such a 

 solution of the difficulty will meet with general acceptance. 



Teleosaurus itself, as now usually restricted, appears to be well 

 represented in certain horizons of the English Oolites, and ranges at 

 least from the Bathonian to the Kimmeridgian beds inclusive. Prof. 

 Sir Richard Owen ^ has identified teeth and vertebrae of the typical 

 species, T. Cadomensis, Geoifr., from the Great Oolites of Enslow 

 (near Woodstock) and Stonestield, and also considers* a cervical 

 vertebra from the Lower Oolites of Chipping Norton to indicate a 

 very closely allied form. The same distinguished palaeontologist, in 

 his "British Fossil Eeptiles," also founds a new species, T. latifrons,^ 

 upon the greater portion of a skull from strata of Great Oolite age in 

 Northamptonshire, but the teeth and some other important parts are 

 wanting ; and Prof. Phillips, in his " Geology of Oxford," adds two 

 more from the well-known Oolitic Flagstones of Stonesfield, which he 

 designates T. hrevidens and T. suhididens, respectively, in allusion to 

 the shape of the teeth. The former species® is founded upon a 

 remarkably complete skull and mandible, and the latter' upon a 

 nearly perfect mandible, with several other fragments ; and associated 

 with the remains of both are numerous vertebree and limb-bones, of 

 which the Professor figures an instructive series. The genus has not 

 hitherto been recorded from the Oxfordian or Corallian deposits ; 

 but Sir Eichard Owen ^ gives the name of T. asthenodeirus to a few 

 detached vertebree found in the Kimmeridge Clay of Shotover Hill, 

 and Mr. J. W. Hulke ^ has made known the discovery of an un- 

 doubted Teleosaurus snout in the equivalent clays of Dorsetshire. 

 This Kimmeridgian specimen is especially remarkable for the expan- 

 sion of its terminal extremity, and accordingly received the name of 

 T. megarhinus, Hulke. 



The remaining Teleosaurs of the Jurassic period seem to belong 



^ T. C. "Winkler, " Etude sur le genre Mystriosaicrus,'^ Archives du Musee Teyler, 

 vol. iv. fasc. i (1876). 



'^ On the assumption that the "Whithy fossil described by Stukely at the beginning 

 of the last century [Philosophical Transactions, 1719, pp. 963-96H (No. 360), pi. i.] 

 belongs to this genus ; the original specimen, however, is now in the British Museum, 

 and is certainly a Plesiosaur. 



^ R. Owen, British Association Reports, 1841, p. 81. 



* Ibid. p. 81. 



* Sir R. Owen, Op. cit., vol. iii. p. 141, pi. xvii, (Crocodilia). 



« Prof. John Phillips, op. cit. pp. 186-189. '^ Ibid. pp. 194, 195. 



^ R. Owen, British Association Reports, 1841, p. 81. 



' J. "W. Hulke, " Note on a Fragment of a Teleosaurian Snout from Kimmeridge 

 Bay, Dorset," Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. xxvii. (1871), p. 442, pi. xviii. This 

 specimen was discovered by Mr. Mansel-Pleydell, and presented by him to the British 

 Museum. 



