THE YEAR'S VERTEBRATE PALAEONTOLOGY 509 



forest of the Masovia district of Poland in the year 1564. By 

 1599 the number was reduced to twenty-four, while in 1602 only 

 four remained, these being reduced in 1620 to one cow, which 

 appears to have been killed seven years later. A few half- 

 domesticated individuals were, however, living in captivity in 

 1627. Herberstain's statement that the aurochs was typically 

 black, with a light dorsal streak, is accepted. Other evidence 

 tends, however, to show that there were grey aurochs ; n Poland, 

 and red ones in Central Germany. This is not the only paper 

 on this subject published during the year, as Dr. M. Auerbach, 

 in the Verhandlungcn der Naturwissenschaftlichen Vereins of 

 Karlsruhe (vol. xx.) has given descriptions of a number of 

 remains of both the urus and the bison preserved in the museum 

 of that city. 



Little appears to have been contributed during the year to 

 our knowledge of the past history of the deer tribe. A con- 

 siderable collection of antlers of reindeer and elk from the 

 Pleistocene of Olai, Livonia, has, however, been described by 

 Mr. G. Schweder, in the Korrespondenzblatt naturf. Vereins of 

 Riga, where it is pointed out that in 1831 the name of Cervus 

 gallinus was suggested by Fischer for the fossil elk antlers from 

 this district. If, therefore, the European elk be eventually split 

 up into local races, this name will have to be considered. 



In the article on vertebrate palaeontology contributed to 

 Science Progress a year ago, reference was made to Dr. 

 Lonnberg's opinion as to the near relationship of the " Irish 

 elk " to the reindeer, and to certain arguments which had been 

 advanced against that view. These arguments have been 

 endorsed and strengthened in a note contributed by Dr. R. F. 

 Scharff to the May number of The Irish Naturalist, 



If the work on fossil Cervidae has been small and unimportant, 

 that accomplished in America in connection with the extinct 

 ruminating oreodonts, or merycoidodonts, and fossil swine has 

 been extensive. Some of these merycoidodonts are described 

 in the paper by Mr. Peterson already referred to ; but by far 

 the most interesting is one from the Miocene of Nebraska, for 

 which Mr. E. Douglass {Annals of the Carnegie Museum, vol. iv. 

 No. 2, 1907) proposes the name of Pronomotherium. The skull 

 is characterised by its shortness, the presence of a small pair 

 of horns above the orbits and of a large cavity in advance of 

 the same, as well as by the extraordinary depth of the hind part 



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