24 Extraordinary Growth of the Incisor Teeth. 



common with other rabbits, before the peculiarity of its teeth 

 was observed, was in an emaciated condition. 



The relative condition of the teeth is as follows : — In the 

 upper jaw the two hinder incisors, if incisors they should be 

 called, are a little and unequally lengthened, and they divari- 

 cate slightly. The larger incisors in front of them are un- 

 equally elongated, the right hand one (supposing one's self 

 the animal) to more than half an inch beyond the usual length, 

 the left hand one to more than a quarter of an inch, and both 

 together are curved towards the interior of the mouth, so as 

 to resemble a large capital of the letter c set backwards (3) ; 

 at and towards their tip they divaricate a little. The incisors 

 of the lower jaw are more and as unequally lengthened, 

 but less suddenly curved upwards ; and thus space is provided 

 for the motion of the curve of the upper incisors within the 

 wider curve of the lower ones. The jaws have had an oblique 

 action, and the degree of obliquity will be clear from the fact, 

 that the right incisor of the upper jaw rests on the basal part 

 of the left incisor of the lower jaw, although it does not stand 

 (so much as) accurately over it; and thus the left incisor of 

 the upper jaw and the right incisor of the lower jaw, when the 

 mouth is closed, have no tooth directly opposed to them. This 

 derangement has affected the grinders thus : the right hand 

 grinders in the upper jaw have worn the grinders opposed to 

 them in the lower jaw in a very oblique form on their inward 

 side ; and the left hand grinders in the upper jaw have worn 

 the grinders opposed to them in the lower jaw in an oblique 

 form on their outward side: the grinders in the upper jaw 

 are obliqued, to correspond with those in the lower jaw, and in 

 both jaws the grinders appear to have been elongated to meet 

 and accommodate each other. On the cause of all this de- 

 rangement I can offer no positive evidence, but notice that 

 the right side of the lower jaw, in the part out of which the 

 grinders arise, exhibits a formation plainly, although not con- 

 spicuously, misshapen, and defective in the solidity and com- 

 pactness of the bone, apparently the result of a fracture at 

 some past time in this part, and the grinders on this side are 

 less uniform in their height and parallelism, and one of them 

 less perfect, than are the grinders in the opposite side of the 

 same (lower) jaw. 



In examining the teeth, in their natural and proper con- 

 dition, of some live and dead rabbits, preparatory to writing 

 the above description of the anomalous formation, I observed 

 that in all of them the lower incisors struck upon the inward 

 face of the upper ones. This fact may have been deemed too 

 well known for mention by previous contributors on this sub- 



