528 Scientific Intelligence. 



4. The Anki/losauridce. A new Family of Armored Dino- 

 saurs from. .theUpper Cretaceous; by Barnum Brown. Bulletin 

 American Museum Natural History, vol. xxiv, art. xii, pp. 187- 

 201. — In this bulletin Mr. Brown describes one of the most 

 unique of dinosaurs, found- by a party from the American Museum 

 in the Hell Creek beds of Montana in 1906. The striking features 

 of this reptile, Ankylosaurus, are its sculptured, plated skull, large, 

 flat or low-ridged body plates, some of which are united as a 

 shield, short-spined vertebras with parapophyses never arising 

 above the centra, and posterior ribs co-ossified to the vertebras. 

 This genus Brown includes under the Stegosauria, but erects for 

 it a new family because of its departure from the more typical 

 members of that group. Mr. Brown has restored the animal after 

 Stegosaurus, modifying the skeleton in accordance with the known 

 elements. His result is strikingly gtyptodon-like, Ankylosaurus 

 representing a remarkable case of convergence towards that mam- 

 malian group. r. s. L. 



5. A Revision of the American Eocene Horses ; by Walter 

 Granger. Bulletin American Museum of Natural History, vol. 

 xxiv, pp. 221-264. — This valuable paper forms one of a series of 

 several, preliminary to a forthcoming treatise on the Equid'ae by 

 Professor H. F. Osborn. The Hyracotheres or Eocene horses 

 have been recorded from the Wasatch upward, with the excep- 

 tion of the Washakie basin of southern Wyoming, predomina- 

 ting over all other forms in the Wasatch of the Big Horn basin. 

 Twenty-six species, embracing some ten different genera, have 

 been described, but Mr. Granger reduces the latter to three, — 

 Epihippus Marsh, from the Uinta ; Orohippus Marsh, from the 

 Bridger, and Eohippus Marsh, ranging through the Wasatch^ 

 Wind River, and, possibly, the Huerfano. In referring these 

 genera to their European equivalents, Granger expresses some 

 doubt, but the closest approach is apparently that of the Eohippus 

 to Hyracotherium in the lower Eocene, and of Epihippus to Lo- 

 phiotherium in the upper Eocene. In his final summary of species, 

 Mr. Granger enumerates twenty-three, of which five are new ; 

 the sub-genus Aminippus being proposed to include the more 

 advanced species of Orohippus from the upper Bridger. 



r. s. L. 



6. Ideas on the Origin of Flight ; by Dr. Baron Francis 

 Nopcsa. Proc. Zoological Society of London, 1907, pp. 223-236. 

 — Baron Nopcsa sharply differentiates flying by means of a pata- 

 gium from flight by means of feathers, as the former requires 

 numerous firm, radial supports to render the soft membrane effec- 

 tive, while for the quills but one line of attachment is needed. 

 Bats and Pterosaurs exhibit an analogous direction of evolution, 

 as shown by the development of the patagium with all that this 

 implies, and have risen in similar manner from leaping, quadru- 

 pedal arboreal forms. " Birds," Nopcsa thinks, "originated from 

 bipedal, long-tailed cursorial reptiles which during running oared 

 along in the air by flapping their free anterior extremities." He 



