NOTES AJJ-D QUERIES. 
267 
perhaps, as those of the "Wealden age, are nevertheless an extraordinary- 
class amongst the fossils of that later period. 
Of Chelonians, we have the beautifully-preserved Chelone Benstedl, ex- 
hibiting the whole of the carapace and a considerable portion of the plas- 
tron ; but although we have the body, nobody, as far as I know, has ever 
found the head of this or any other Chalk-turtle. As we may infer that 
turtles in those times were not headless, we may hope that collectors in 
Chalk districts will use their endeavours to find some of the heads our 
Chalk -turtles have lost. 
Besides the Chelone Benstedi, there have been found in the Chalk, por- 
tions of the large species of turtle recorded by Camper as occurring in the 
Maestricht beds, — the Chelone Camperi of Owen. Indeterminate frag- 
ments of other species Kave been also noted in Professor Owen's * Me- 
moir.' 
Of the Lacertilia, we have from the Lower Chalk of Cambridge. Maid- 
stone, and Northfleet, the Itaphiosaurus suhulidens {H. lucius of Dixon) ; 
the Coniosaurus crassidens, from Clayton, AVorthing, and Charing, and the 
railway cutting between Brighton and Lewes ; the Dolichosaurus lonai- 
collis, from Burliam, a strange, small, wonderfully long, thin form, of which 
only one specimen is known, one head and upper moiety being in the col- 
lection of Mrs. Smith, of Tunbridge Wells, and a second portion, contain- 
iDg the posterior, abdominal, and sacral vertebra?, with portions of the 
hinder limbs, in the collection of Sir Philip Egcrton. 
Then of the swimming lizards we have the great Mosasaurus, some spe- 
cies attaining a length of 25 feet, a genus made ever famous by the Canon 
Goddin's specimen, captured by the French at the siege of Maestricht. 
The British chalk-beds have yielded various portions of M. rfvacilis, chiefly 
from Sussex and Kent. Another mosasauroid form, the Leiodon anceps, 
has been found in a chalk-pit in Essex and in the Brighton railway-cutting 
near Lewies. 
Of crocodiles, the English chalk — for it is of this English chalk we are 
now solely speaking — has yielded Polt/ptijchodon internipfus in the Chalk- 
marl ; P. continuus. Lower Chalk ; Plcsiosauriis Bernanii in the Lower 
Chalk of Dover ; P. constrictus, from Steyning, in Sussex ; and some 
other remains, possibly of other species, in the Clialk of Kent and Sussex ; 
Ichthyosaurus campylodon, from the cuttings in the Grey Chalk for the 
Dover E-ailway, and from the Upper Greensand of Cambridge. 
Of the strange Order Pterosauria, or winged reptiles, abundant remains 
have been found in the Kentish chalk, chiefly at Burham, on the hillside 
of the Medw^ay valley. The nature of these remains was first establislied 
by Dr. Bowerbank, for previously they had been more or less doubtfully 
assigned to birds. A large fossil wing-bone of Pterodactylus (jiganteus, 
from the Middle Chalk of that locality, — sometimes erroneously referred 
to as that of an albatross, — was figured, in 1845, in the Proceedings of 
the Geological Society by him ; and in the same paper, characteristic jaws 
and teeth, and various bones of other species were briefly noticed. 
The expanse of wing of this Pterodactyle was estimated, from the pro- 
portions of Goldfuss' P. crassirostris, at least 9 feet. Another gigantic 
flying reptile, P. Cuvieri, was exhibited by the same geologist before the 
Zoological Society in 1851. Tiie specimen was a portion of jaw without 
any traces of nasal perforations, 7 inches in length ; and Professor Owen 
estimates the entire skull at close upon 2\ feet in length. The P. coni- 
rostris of Owen, in Dixon's ' Geology of Sussex,' is a synonym of Bower- 
bank's P. giganteus. Another species, from the Middle Chall? of Kent, 
also in Dr. Bowcrbank's collection, has been described by Professor Owen, 
— P. compressirostris. 
