PALZONTOLOGY 
EDFORD is a county of comparatively little interest to the 
vertebrate paleontologist, although it is probable that if the 
remains of reptiles from the Oxford Clay were collected as care- 
fully as they have been in the neighbouring county of Hunting- 
don, the number of species from that formation might be very largely 
increased. Apparently only two species of fossil vertebrates—one a 
plesiosaur and the other a reptile of unknown affinity—have been 
named on the evidence of Bedfordshire specimens. ‘The four horizons 
from which vertebrate fossils have been obtained in the county are the 
Pleistocene gravels of the valley of the Ouse near Bedford, the Cam- 
bridge Greensand, the Lower Greensand beds of Potton and the Oxford 
Clay. Most, if not all, of the vertebrate fossils in the Potton Sands are 
derived from older formations, chiefly the Kimeridge Clay, and they 
are therefore of much less interest than would be the case were they 
native to the deposit in which they occur. 
The occurrence of mammalian remains in the gravels of the Ouse 
valley was first recorded by the late Mr. James Wyatt,’ whose collection 
now belongs to the corporation of Bedford. The most important pits 
whence the remains were obtained are those of Cardington, Harrowden, 
Biddenham and Kempston. The species recorded by Mr. Wyatt (many 
of whose specimens were submitted to Sir R. Owen) are as follows :— 
The wild ox or aurochs (Bos taurus primigenius), the red deer (Cervus 
elaphus), the reindeer (Rangifer tarandus), the Pleistocene hippopotamus 
(Hippopotamus amphibius major), the woolly rhinoceros (Rhinoceros antt- 
guitatis), the straight-tusked elephant (E/ephas antiquus) and an undeter- 
mined species of bear. Specimens in the Wyatt collection are referred 
to the mammoth (Edephas primigenius), Pleistocene bison (Bos priscus), 
and cave-bear (Ursus spelaus). 
As I learn from private information, the Chalk—notably its middle 
and lower divisions—has yielded remains of fishes. Among these, the 
ridged and pustulated quadrangular crushing teeth of the ray-like 
Prychodus are by no means uncommon, as are the pointed teeth of sharks 
of the genus Lamna, while those of another type of shark, Corax, are 
more rarely met with. Other remains of fishes have been referred to the 
genera Cimolichthys and Enchodus. 
1 See Quart. Fourn. Geol. Soc. xvii. 366 (1861), xviii. 113 (1862), xx. 183 (1864). 
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