FOSSIL BIRDS AT VERO. 
37 
sponding one in the skeletons of a great variety of waders of differ¬ 
ent families and genera. It belonged to some species of a heron, 
quite closely related to those of the genus Ardea of the same general 
size, and larger than such a form as the existing Nycticorax n. 
naevius. This specimen is somewhat too imperfect for reference, 
or to base a new species upon. It should be set aside until addi¬ 
tional material is discovered that may throw more light on the 
question with respect to the species, living or extinct, to which it 
probably belonged or represents. 
HERONS ? (sp. ?) Stratum 3. 
(Plate I., Figs. 5, 6, 9-11.) 
No. 7554. This is a rather large, elongate vertebra from the 
anterior end of the chain of the cervical vertebrae of the neck of 
some heron of medium size; it is more or less perfect anteriorly, 
but broken off posteriorly. Comparisons have been made with the 
corresponding bone in the skeleton of the neck in a large number 
of waders of all kinds, as heron, egrets, spoonbills, and their various 
allies. Of all these it comes nearest to Herodias egretta. The 
specimen is, however, in the absence of other bones from the same 
bird, too fragmentary to refer it with certainty to any existing 
species, or to base a new species upon. 
In the same lot occur two other vertebrae (Figs. 9 and 10, Plate 
I.), and also a distal piece of a tarso-metatarsus (Fig. 11, Plate I.). 
All three of these are too small to have belonged to birds of the size 
which furnished the tibiotarsus shown in Figure 5, or the vertebra 
shown in Figue 6 of this plate. These two small vertebrae (Figs. 
9 and 10) may have been from the same skeleton to which the piece 
of a tarso-metatarsus, shown in Figure 11, belonged; but there is no 
certainty about this. All three may quite possibly have belonged 
to some average-sized wader of the heron order; but it is impossible 
to be certain about this until additional material comes to light at 
Vero, of the same kind and character, and representing the same 
species. 
