ANNALS OF THE QUEENSLAND MUSEUM, No. 6 
81 
end of this bone could not have been very far from the actual 
end of the symphysis caudad, yet it bears no trace whatever of 
the entry of splenial bones, their apparent absence being probably 
due to the same cause as the obliteration of the symphysial suture. 
The second mandibular piece most probably formed a great part 
of the anterior moiety of the same symphysis, since in size, pro- 
portions, and structure, it resembles the posterior portion very 
closely. It has been split horizontally through the alveoli, of 
which seven only appear in the drawing of the inferior half, 
the base of an eighth at the anterior end being hidden 
from view. As the middle part of the bone and also some portion 
of it at each end are missing, its whole length must have been 
very much greater than 335 mm., and as sixteen teeth are indicated 
by the parts preserved, the number of the whole set must have 
been as great as in the Gavials. Further discovery may, indeed, 
shew that these mandibular remains belonged to two different 
individuals, a contingency hardly probable, but even then the 
presence of eight teeth in a portion only of a symphysis would make 
good a claim to membership in the family of the Gavialidce. All 
things considered, it appears to the writer more likely that this 
Crocodile belonged, if to any existing genus, to the Indian Gavialis 
than to the Bornean Tomistoma, and to the former genus it is 
provisionally referred under the name Gavialis papuensis. The 
fossils under review came to hand in two lots at a long interval 
of time. Among the first comers were the two dorsal scutes shewn 
on Plate XIII . , figs. 3 and 4. These appeared at the time to resemble 
the corresponding scutes of Philas johnstonii so closely, differing 
from them no more than similar scutes from different individuals 
of that species varied from each other, that they suggested a possible 
explanation of the mystery of the isolation of the long-nosed 
crocodile in the fresh waters of Northern Australia, and were 
figured with that view. The advent of the mandible has put an 
end to all speculation in that direction, all the bones evidently 
belong to the same species. These scutes and the mandible 
very possibly belonged to the same individual. Not so, how- 
ever, with a third scute. This is 75 mm. in breadth, a size 
which makes it probable that the species grew to a length 
of twelve or thirteen feet. The vertebrae are three presacral, 
one sacral, and two caudal, doubtless derived from the same 
skeleton, but all very imperfect and for determinative purposes 
useless. It is, indeed, only from the shape and proportions of the 
intervertebral surfaces of their centra that their position in the 
vertebral column can be made out. The only ichthyan relic is a 
vertebra of a large shark. 
