Ch. XVI.] 



MIDDLE EOCENE, ENGLAND. 



289 



caudal vertebrae indicate so much anology with Hydrus as to induce 

 Professor Owen to pronounce this extinct ophidian to have been 

 marine.* He had previously combated with much success the evi- 



Fig. 236. 



PaZceophis typJioeus, Owen ; an Eocene sea-serpent Bracklesham. 

 a, &. Vertebra, with long neural spine preserved, c. Two vertebrae in natural articulation. 



dence advanced to prove the existence in the Northern Ocean of 

 huge sea-serpents in our own times, but he now contends for the for- 

 mer existence in the British Eocene seas of less gigantic serpents, 

 when the climate was probably more genial ; for amongst the compan- 

 ions of the sea-snake of Bracklesham was an extinct Gavial (Gavialis 

 Dixo?ii, Owen), and a numerous fish, such as now frequent the seas 

 of warm latitudes, as the ostraceont fish, of which a spine is figured 

 (see fig. 237), and gigantic rays of the genus Myliobates (see fig. 

 238). 



Fig. 237 



Defensive spine of an Ostraceon, or fish of the family Balistidm. 

 Bracklesham. Dixon's Fossils of Sussex, pi. 11, fig. 26. 



Fig. 23a 



Fie. 239. 



Dental plates of Jfyliobates Edwardsi. 

 Bracklesham Bay. Ibid., pi. 8. 



Nvmmulites (Nwnmularia) laevigata. 

 Bracklesham. Ibid., pi. 8. 

 a. Section of the nummnlite. 

 5. Group, with an individual showing the exterior 



of the shell. 



The teeth of sharks also, of the genera Carcharodon, Otodus, 

 Lamna, Galeocerdo, and others, are abundant. (See figs. 240, 241, 242, 

 243.) The Nummulites laevigata (see fig. 239), so characteristic of 



Palaeont Son. Monograph. Rept., Pt. ii. p. 61. 



19 



