282 
work where he has displayed so many remains of these animals, mis- 
taken the shoulderbone of a tortoise for the horn of a stag ; fragments 
of the sternal plates ( plastrons ) of a tortoise for the branched part of 
the horns of the elk ; and two bones of the carpus, belonging also to the 
tortoise, for the pubis and the clavicle of a crocodile. Similar remains to 
those found by Mr. Johnson, are sometimes found in the Staunsfield 
lime-stone. 
Plate XVIII. Fig. 3, is the fossil head of a tortoise, found at Shepey 
by Mr. Crow. 
The necessity of ascertaining the number of existing species of the 
crocodile, and of pointing out their distinctive characters, previous to 
the examination of their fossil remains, must be obvious; and that this 
task has been performed by M. Cuvier, who possesses abilities and 
opportunities so well fitted for the undertaking^ a circumstance which 
has considerably promoted the advancement of our knowledge in our 
favourite science. The gratitude due to him, on the present occasion, is 
considerably augmented bythe consideration, that at the period at which 
his investigations were made, almost every one who had written on 
the subject had unfortunately contributed, by their errors, to envelope 
the subject in confusion. M. Schneider, however, had sedulously em- 
ployed himself, and with some success, in making some useful and 
important distinctions, with respect to these animals ; Histoire des 
Amphibies, cap. n. But the most instructive labours were those of M. 
Geoffroy, who not only made some important anatomical researches on 
the crocodile of the Nile, but alsoon the crocodile of St. Domingo, which 
bore so strong a resemblance to that of the Nile, as to have led to the 
suspicion that they were both of the same species ; and, of course, to 
a doubt as to the circumstance dwelt on by Buffon, that no species 
belonging to the torrid zone had been primitively in both continents. 
The observations, however, of M. Gregoire, determined that the cro- 
codile of St. Domingo deserved to be regarded as of a different species 
from that of the Nile. Ann. du Mus. Nat. T. i. p. 37 and 53. 
