OF TILGATE FOREST. 
263 
crocodiles; some (fig. 3.) are more obtuse than those 
of the crocodile of the Nile, and resemble the teeth 
of the second species of the fossil crocodiles of the 
Jura limestone, described by Baron Cuvier, vol. v. 
p. 142, Ofifi. F'o.ss. : others (fig. 2.) are more slender, 
and possess a greater degree of curvature, bearing 
a close analogy to those from Caen.* The largest 
s])ccimens in my possession must liave belonged 
to an animal between twenty and thirty feet long. 
Scales of a Gavial ? — Strong, thick scales, of a 
dark-brown colour, and possessing a high polish, 
are very abundant in the Tilgate stratii ; those 
with bifurcating processes of attachment belong 
to the Lepisosteus Fittoni ; but there are others 
of a different form, which we compared with the 
scales of a living alligator, and found them to 
resemble those which cover the legs of that ani- 
mal. The scales of the fossil crocodile of Caen 
are described as being very thick, rectangular, 
thin towards the edge, and having the outer surfiice 
covered with little pits or hollows ; we have not 
observed any with the characters here described, 
in the strata of Tilgate Forest, 
KertehrcE. — In the recent crocodile, the ver- 
tebra' are convex posteriorly, and concave an- 
teriorly ; but those from Tilgate, like the vertebras 
of the crocodile of Caen, and of one of the species 
of Havre, are, with but very few exceptions. 
• We compared some of these fossils with the teeth of a crocodile 
from the banks of the Ganges, preserved in the museum of the East 
India Company, and could not detect any essential difference. Figs. 
25, 26, 27. 30. pi. x. tome v. Cuvier’s “ Ossemens Fossiles,” repre- 
sent teeth of the Tilgate Gavial. Vide also Foss. Tilg. Forest. 
S 4 
