Page:Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, vol. 26.djvu/100

14 saw filled with the reliquiæ of the great land Saurian contained no other than his personal remains.

"When the Stonesfield fossils came before me for lectures to a practical class, it was often my desire to present a sketch of the skeleton for comparison with that of a crocodile, and a pleasure to me to employ in this way such knowledge of the osteology of reptiles as a few dissections, now thirty or forty years ago, of each great reptilian group had fixed in my mind. For making these drawings on a large scale I was obliged to examine and consider several times the great bone called by Cuvier 'coracoid,' and to complete it by adding, after the pattern of Varanus, the extensions toward the sternum. When this was done, the magnitude of the thoracic region became such as to terrify me, and I looked eagerly through the collection for anything to relieve my alarm. Not being able to find any trace of sternal or episternal bones, I examined the curiously bent bone commonly referred to clavicle, and perceived that it was of the same order of magnitude. Next a set of spatulate bones, in fragments, came under my notice, and I speedily decided, ex necessitate, these to be scapulæ. When completely restored they presented long flattened bones, concave on one broad face, convex on the other. I know no scapulæ like them except those of birds; and among birds none appeared to fit so well in the comparison as Apteryx. Then I reflected—a scapula like this, how could it belong to a coracoid like that? Examining for this purpose the humeral extremity of the bone, and collecting all the examples, I found it was composed of two elements ossified together, these elements concurring on one edge to form an articular cavity. Of these elements the broader and shorter one, which extended toward the sternum, was coracoidian in form, and perforated in each of four specimens. If, as appeared now to be the case, this was the coracoid, surely the great heavy bone so long called by that name was a pelvic bone, and the restoration of the skeleton must proceed on an entirely new basis.

"It soon became evident that the bone so long regarded as a clavicle must be removed from the place it had occupied, with the so-called coracoid, to which it was proportioned. It could not be attached to the now ascertained scapulo-coracoidian arch. It seemed calumnious to assign such a bandy-legged bone to either the radial or tibial alliance—besides that there could be presented a better claimant for the honours of the fibula, if not of radius or ulna. What could this bone be? In this state of uncertainty you found me, and helped me to a clearer view of the whole case now opening. I showed you the long bones which seemed to me to have the best claim to be regarded as of the fore limb, remarking that every thing seemed to indicate the fore limb of Megalosaurus to have been comparatively light and applicable,—not merely a strong support to a heavy body, as was thought to be the case when the huge