186 ANNUAL RECORD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



thin out or exterminate the rats ; and, as the serpents are 

 perfectly harmless, it is not believed that their presence in 

 any number will be at all injurious, especially as in the ab- 

 sence of abundant prey they would starve out in a short 

 time. The mungoose again, being a conspicuous animal, can 

 be easily reduced in number or entirely destroyed when their 

 services cease to be of use, their habits also being such as to 

 keep them more readily under the eye and control of man, 

 thereby enabling him to destroy them at pleasure. 2* A, 

 1871, August 5, 77, 



PRE-HISTORIC HORSE. 



According to Professor Owen, who has examined animal 

 remains from the cavern of Bruniquel, the human bones show 

 most affinity with the Celtic types, the cranium being oval 

 and rather dolicocephalous than brachycephalous in general 

 proportion. The cranial capacity corresponds to that of un- 

 educated Europeans of Celtic origin, and exceeds that of the 

 average of Australian aborigines. 



Professor Owen, referring to certain carvings on the ani- 

 mal bones accompanying the remains, says that some of them 

 are pictures of the heads of horses, and show much artistic 

 skill. They represent an animal with short pointed ears, the 

 stallions having beard-like hairs. The tails of the horses also 

 appear to have been short, and furnished with long hairs to 

 their base instead of having these hairs form a kind of tuft 

 nearer the end of the tail. Professor Owen finds no evidence 

 any where of an aboriginal wild horse resembling that of the 

 present day, no remains of the kind existing in any museum; 

 and it is probable that the delineations of the cave horse of 

 Bruniquel represent all that we are likely to know of the 

 form of the primitive stock from which the present horse is 

 descended. 4 D, L., 423. 



MONSTROSITY IN A HORSE'S HOOF. 



Some of our readers may be interested in an account of a 

 curious monstrosity in the hoof of a horse, as reported in the 

 Proceedings of the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal. In this 

 animal a supernumerary digit was formed on each fore foot, 

 incased in an asymmetrical hoof, a similar condition occur- 

 ring on the hind foot, but with less regularity. This speci- 





