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portant information yielded by M. Cuvier, as to the specific differences 
of such of these animals as have been found in a fossil state. The 
observations, however, which I have been able to make, are such, as 
far as they extend, as serve to confirm the opinions of M. Cuvier. 
Several fragments, which I have seen, from the Dorsetshire coast, 
as well as those which I possess, show, that the anterior termination 
of the snout of one species of these fossil animals, whose remains are 
found in this island, was long and narrow, like that of the first species 
described by M. Cuvier. Three other specimens which I have seen, 
one containing almost the whole skull, and the others the anterior 
part of the skull, and all having the posterior part of the branches of 
the lower jaw attached to the upper jaw, manifest decidedly the same 
gradual approximation of the branches of the lower jaw, which we 
have seen distinguishes this fossil species from all the known species 
of the sub-genus Gavial. The first of these was exhibited in the Lon- 
don Museum ; and, of the latter two, one was in the possession of the 
late Mr. Row, of Dorsetshire, and the other was exposed for sale by 
auction. These specimens were all British fossils ; and evinced, by 
the form of their anterior part, that they had derived their origin from 
the same species of animal to which the specimens above mentioned 
had belonged. The union of these specimens prove therefore decid- 
edly, that in this island, as well as on the continent, there exist the 
remains of a species of crocodile, approaching towards, but essentially 
differing from, any known species of the Gavial. Of the head of the 
second species, no specimen which I have seen affords me any positive 
information. 
Of the two species of vertebrae described by M. Cuvier, I only 
possess specimens corresponding with those which he supposes to 
belong to the second species which he has particularized. Two de- 
tached vertebrae, which are, I conjecture, from Bath ; three which 
are disposed in their natural order, and imbedded in the Dorsetshire 
blue limestone ; and several others, in the same limestone, the sections 
