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Show 170 PROP. T. J. PARKER ON THE CRANIAL [Feb. 14, recurrence of the parts gave the impression that the conditions met with might have been due to increased tension on the right side during growth. This was favoured by the fact that the right tibia and fibula, which were abnormal and angulated, bore traces of early fracture with subsequent synostosis, and by that of the non-distortion of the left anterior half of the presternum. It was, however, rendered the less likely by the fact that the xiphisternum, together with the posterior (fifth) mesosternal rudiment1, was but feebly ossified ; and by the fact that the former (fig. 1, st'"), instead of being posteriorly expanded as is most frequently the case with normal adults, was displaced to the left side, heeled along its left-hand border, and downwardly rotated. Although the departures from the normal met with in the sternum under consideration may conceivably have been due to purely mechanical causes, consequent upon the non-union of parts, they suggest the well-known characteristics 2 of that of the Anthropomorpha, among Primates ; and, whatever their determining causes, the regularly recurring alternation of the mesosternal elements of opposite sides is especially interesting in this conjunction, as that has been independently recorded by Parker3 and Flower4 for the (apparently normal) developing sternum of the Orang. Prof. T. Jeffery Parker, D.Sc, F.R.S., read a Memoir on the Cranial Osteology,Classification, and Phylogeny of the Dinornithidce, of which the following is an abstract:- The author begins by giving a brief account of his material, amounting altogether to about 120 skulls, most of them in the Otago University Museum, Dunedin, Canterbury College, Christ-church, N e w Zealand, and the British Museum (Natural History). Two specimens, one of Emeus, sp. a, in the Dunedin Museum, and one of Mesopteryx, species /3, in the Wellington Museum, are quite perfect. Many of the skulls examined could not be assigned with certainty to any known species, having been found quite apart from the rest of the skeletons; they are distinguished in the paper by Greek letters in order to avoid confusion with certain species designated by English letters by Mr. Lydekker. Several species are known only by the crania, and in these cases the determination of the genus is to some extent conjectural, since the premaxilla and mandible afford the most striking and reliable generic characters. A detailed description of the cranial osteology is given, the various genera and species being compared point by point. By the 1 The investigations of Ruge and Burne forbid our regarding the reduction of this as necessarily indicative of a persistently embryonic state (cf. Burne, P.Z. S. 1891, p. 159). J W 2 Viz., increase in breadth, with diminution of length and reduction of the ensiform process. 3 Ray Soc. Monograph on the Development of the Shoulder-girdle and Sternum, pi. xxx. fig. 10. 4 Osteology of the Mammalia, ed. 3, p. 93, fig. 32. |
