1823.] ThilosopMcal Transactions for 1823, Fart L 307 



Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, for 

 1823. Parti. 



{Concluded from p. 227.) 



IX. On some Fossil Bones discovered in Caverns in the Lime- 

 stone Quarries of Oreston, By Joseph Whidbey, Esq. FRS. In 

 a Letter addressed to John Barrow, Esq. FRS. To which is 

 added, A Description of the Bones, by Mr. WilHam Clift, Con- 

 servator of the Museum of the College of Surgeons. — (See 

 Annals, v. 233.) 



When adverting to the rarity of appearances of disease or 

 fracture in fossil bones, in reference to such appearances in 

 some of those from Oreston, as described in our report of this 

 paper, Mr. Chft remarks, " On mentioning this circumstance to 

 Prof. Buckland, he informed me, that he had lately seen in the 

 collection of Prof. Sommerring, of Munich, the skull of a very 

 old hyaena from the caves of Gaylenreuth, in which the incisor 

 and canine teeth, with the jaw containing them, had been 

 entirely torn away, and the occipital and parietal crest dread- 

 fully fractured and perforated, apparently in an affray with some 

 more powerful animal ; after which a healing and partial renova- 

 tion of the parts had taken place, and the animal had lived on 

 to mature old age, from the state of its masticating organs." 



" Of the bovine genus," among the bones described by Mr. 

 Clift, " there are specimens of the bony core of the horns 

 .belonging to three individuals of different size ; all of them 

 remarkably short, conical, and slightly curved, and standing in 

 ;a nearly horizontal direction from the head. They evidently do 

 .not belong to very young animals, and from the appearance of 

 these alone, a very small species would be inferred; but nume- 

 >rous specimens of the teeth, of the os humeri, ulna and radius, 

 OS femoris, tibia, os calcis, metacarpus and metatarsus, and pha- 

 langes, clearly prove that they belonged to individuals consider- 

 ably larger than the average size of animals of that genus at the 

 present day. 



" The number of bones collected, afford sufficient grounds for 

 supposing them to have belonged to more than a dozen indivi- 

 K- duals, varying considerably in their age." 



The bones and teeth of five or six hysenas which formed part 

 of this remarkable collection, have already been mentioned in 

 the Annals. " But there are likewise detached specimens of the 

 canine teeth, and molares of individuals of very large size ; and 

 the posterior part of a skull of uncommon magnitude, which 

 corresponds most exactly in form with that of a hyaena, and 

 must undoubtedly have belonged to that animal, but measures 

 twice as much from every determinate point to another, as a 

 recent full grown hyaena's skull." 



" Since the above was written, Mr. Whidbey has transmitted 



x2 



