Medical and Physical Researches; Or, Original Memoirs in Medicine, Surgery, Physiology, Geology, Zoology, and Comparative Anatomy (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1835. Excerpt: ... Observations on a large Skeleton recently disinterred from the mouth of the Mississippi River. These bones have excited much curiosity in this country, and have even been noticed in some European publications: they have been referred, by different individuals, to the fossil remains of some extinct animals, and it has been proposed by the late Dr. Godman to construct upon them a new fossil genus, to be designated "MegistosauKus." (Greatest of all lizards.) In a verbal communication, which I had occasion to make to the Academy of Natural Sciences, some months since, before I had an opportunity of examining these remnants, I offered it as my opinion, (judging from the descriptions which I had received concerning this subject, from persons unacquainted with natural history, ) that they were the remains of some large Cetaceous animal. On a late visit to Baltimore, I enjoyed the opportunity of a particular examination of these specimens, and was gratified to learn, that the opinions which I had previously formed were correct. On the first view, it was very easy to perceive that the bones were not fossil, but that they were portions of the skeleton of the recent spermaceti whale, " Physcter maerocephalus." Indeed the situation, or geological relations of these bones would preclude the possibility of their being fossil. The remains of three different individuals were distinguishable, and the following parts were noticed.--The largest portion consists of the superior maxillary bone of the left side--the total length of which, measured in the direction of its curvature exteriorly, is seventeen feet three inches, the greatest breadth thirteen inches; there are belonging to the same animal seven dorsal vertebrae, six lumbar, and five caudal, with two ribs, all in a pe...