94 ON MEGALANI A AND ITS ALLIES, 



which thus led to our conception of Megalania as the Great Horned 

 Lizard of Australia, so far as such reasons were recorded. A recent 

 discovery throws direct light upon vertebra of this type, shewing 

 that Sir R. Owen was quite right in declaring them to be so 

 Varanian in character as to be almost Varanus, and consequently 

 that his later view of their affinity is the one which is not correct. 



Among a number of fossils disinterred during the past year 

 by Mr. R. W. Fro-t, of King's Creek, to whom this branch of 

 research is much indebted, were a series of eight vertebra? (recognis- 

 able at a glance as Megalanian), a series of six ribs, an imperfect 

 distal end of a fibula, and a nearly perfect ulna — these, together 

 with as many other bones (including a dentigerous jaw) given 

 by Mr. Frost to a local collector, and thereby secluded from 

 examination so far, were, discovered lying together in such relative 

 positions, in a common matrix, as to convince the finder, who was 

 then unaware of the value of such evidence, that all were parts of 

 the game individual. Mr. Frost's opinion is strongly corroborated 

 by their obvious identity as to kind and degree of mineralization, as 

 well as to their peculiar subochreous colouration derived from the 

 rather ferruginous sand in which they were buried. 



First impressions persuade us that the ulna and the ribs could 

 cnly have belonged to a gigantic Varan ; second thoughts convince 

 us that the ham rous and scapula described by the writer, under 

 the name of Notiosaurus dcntatus, Ow , the present lonjj bones and 

 all the known vertebras, while departing equilly from the corres- 

 ponding bones in Varanus in one common character, greater breadth 

 in proportion to length, agree also in presenting no other feature of 

 importance tending to remove them from the Varanida?. 



As to the ulna, we have in the form of its distal end a safe 

 guide to the family to which it pertains. Oblongo-clavate in shape 

 in Australian, and presumably ?n other lizards, this part of the bone 

 is in the Geckonidas, Agamida3,and Scincidae merely a little modified 

 by a flattening of its ulnar side, which scarcely affects the oval form 

 of its articulating surface. In certain Agamians, however, e.g. 

 Chlamvdosauru.«, a slight swelling of the ulno- palmar angle produces 



