AIR-BREATHERS OP THE COAL PERIOD. 9 



implanted in shallow sockets in the maxillary and premaxillary 

 bones, and are anchylosed to the sockets. For the lower third, the 

 outer surface presents shallow vertical grooves, conformably with 

 the plicated character of the internal structure (Figs. 3, 7, and 10). 

 The upper portion is smooth, and its internal structure presents 

 merely radiating tubes of ivory, and concentric layers, (Figs. 3, 

 6, and 9). The whole of these characters are regarded as allying 

 the animal with the great crocodilian frogs of the Trias of Europe, 

 first known as Cheirotherians, owing to the remarkable hand-like 

 impressions of their feet, and afterwards as Labyrinthodonts, from 

 the beautifully complicated convolutions of the ivory of their teeth. 

 The only additional remains attributable to this creature, found 

 since the publication of Professor Owen's description, are the 

 bone represented in Fig. 12, and the scute or scale represented 

 in Fig. 11. The former may be a scapular or sternal bone, and, 

 if so, would warrant the belief that the creature possessed anterior 

 limbs of considerable size ; the proportion relatively to the skull 

 being much the same as in the American bullfrog. The latter is 

 marked in the same way as the bones of the head, and would 

 indicate that Baphetes was protected by bony dermal scales, re- 

 sembling those of the crocodile. 



There is one point illustrated by the bone represented in Fig. 

 12, to which I would earnestly invite the attention of comparative 

 anatomists. It is the distortion to which bones are subjected 

 when imbedded in soft deposits, especially those containing 

 vegetable matter. In modern peat bogs, skulls have been found 

 nearly as pliable as leather, owing to the partial removal of their 

 phosphate of lime ; and in clay beds they are often found softer 

 than chalk, from to the removal of their animal matter. Human 

 skulls, buried under no great weight of earth, have often been 

 strangely distorted from this posthumous softening. Even teeth 

 are affected in this way. In the remains of the old Indian 

 village of Hochelaga, at Montreal, while the teeth of bears are 

 found in the drier and more sandy soil quite perfect and unal- 

 tered, in damp places, and where they are imbedded in organic 

 matter thrown out from the cabins, they are softened, so that a 

 large canine may be easily compressed between the finger and 

 thumb. Changes of this kind have no doubt been experienced 

 by all the bones imbedded in coal, carbonaceous shale, and similar 

 deposits ; and in the great compression which the mass has ex- 

 perienced, the bones, yielding with it, have been flattened and dis- 



