38 
Mr. F. E. Beddard on the 
from forming by their union a catapophysial canal, such 
as is to be found on the neck- vertebrae of many birds. It 
often happens that the vertebrae ^hich immediately follow 
that which bears the last pair o£ catapophyses are furnished 
only with a single median hypapophysis^ the transition being 
thus perfectly abrupt between the paired and unpaired ventral 
median process of the vertebral centra. Now, in Aramus 
there is a transition ; for the fourteenth vertebra, although 
it has indeed but a single median hypapophysis, has that 
hypapophysis distinctly bifid at its free extremity, which 
Fig. 1. 
^e.N\ 
Neck-vertebrse of Balearica (right-hand figure) and Aramzts 
(left-hand figure). Nat. size. 
naturally suggests that it is the product of a fused pair of 
catapophyses. This process is not bifid upon the remaining 
hypapophyses of the cervical series. We may now compare 
the conditions which obtain in Aramus with those which 
prevail in other genera of the Gruidse. 
In Grus caruncuJata, which will serve as a type of the 
restricted genus Grus, the conditions are really practically 
identical. The only difference is associated with the larger 
number of the cervical vertebise of this bird. In it the 
last vertebra which possesses paired catapophyses is the 
