680 RECORDS. 



The following program was then offered : 



H. F. Osborn, On the Relation of the Centra and Inter- 

 centra IN the Cervical Vertebra of Lizards, Mosasaurs 

 and Sphenodon. 



Arthur HoUick, The Discovery of a Mastodon's Tooth 

 and Remains of a Boreal Vegetation on Staten Island. 



C. L, Bristol, A Report of the New York University Ex- 

 pedition TO THE Bermuda Islands in the Summer of i 899. 



Summary of Papers. 



Professor Osborn called attention to the confused statements 

 relating to the cervical vertebra; in the Lizards, Mosasaurs and 

 Sphenodon, and pointed out that both Gegenbaur and Wieder- 

 sheim, the principal German authorities on the comparative 

 anatomy of vertebrates failed to recognize clearly the important 

 part played by intercentra of the neck region. He then, com- 

 mencing with Sphenodon, pointed out that we have a series of 

 intercentra or intervertebral ossicles, extending throughout the. 

 Avhole length of the backbone, but considerably modified by a 

 coalescence with the atlas and axis. In Platecarpiis, the Cre- 

 taceous Mosasaur, on the other hand, the intercentra of the axis 

 and atlas are entirely free and separate, retaining their primitive 

 wedge-shaped form, while the centrum proper or odontoid proc- 

 ess is also free from the axis ; in the remaining cervicals the 

 intercentra are secondarily shifted forward upon the hypapo- 

 physes. Varamis, the monitor lizard, exhibits a still greater ex- 

 tension of these hypapophyses with the intercentra placed at 

 their tips. In Cyclnnis, on the other hand, the intercentra are 

 still in their primitive position between the \^ertebr£e. There is 

 no question, therefore, that true intercentra are \'eiy important 

 elements in Lizards and Mosasaurs, and that the}' are second- 

 arily modified partly by coalescence with the atlas and parti}' b}- 

 adhesion to the hypapophyses, this showing a complete change 

 of function. 



The leading facts in Doctor Hollick's paper are as follows : 

 In the Moravian Cemetery at New Dorp, Staten Island, im- 

 mediately in the rear of the Kunhardt Mausoleum, was a swamp, 



