360 Fossil Walrus. 



Nat. Hist, of N. York, by the late Dr Mitchell, is a bovine 

 skull, which Dr Dekay has minutely described as above re- 

 ferred to, and compares it with the skull of the Bos moschatus, 

 which it most nearly resembles. 



Similar fossils have been occasionally found in Siberia, which 

 it is supposed were probably carried there in ice from the 

 American continent. Vid, Cuv. Anim. Foss. vol. iv. pi. 3, fig, 

 9 and 10 ; also, Ozeretskovsky, Memoirs of the Royal Academy 

 of St Petersburg, 1809-10. 



Locality. — " New Madrid, on the banks of the Mississippi 

 river, ejected by the earthquake of ISIS." 



ORDER CARNASSIERS, Cuv. 



Genus Teichecus, Lin. The Walrus. 



T. rosmarus, Lin. 



Cuv. Recherches sur les Ossemens Fossiles, torn. v. Cooper, Ann. Lye. Nat. 

 Hist, of N. York, vol. ii. p. 271. 



Only slight indications of the existence of a fossil morse or 

 walrus have been hitherto observed in any country ; a few molar 

 teeth, and some fragments of bone found in France, have been 

 referred to this species. In the work above alluded to, Mr 

 Cooper has given a lucid account of a mutilated fossil skull in 

 the cabinet of the Lyceum, which, without doubt, belonged to 

 the walrus ; the skull is remarkably hard and heavy, the tusks 

 having become almost agatized. On comparison with similar 

 portions of the T. rosmarus of Linn., it displayed strong spe- 

 cific affinity. 



Locality. — Accomac county, Virginia. 



Place in the Geological series. — Atlantic tertiary .? along with 

 the fossil bones of Cetacea. 



Captain Beechey brought home with him from the north-west 

 coast of America the fossil vertebrae of an unknown extinct 

 mammalia ; on comparing the fossil casts of these vertebrae 

 with the amphibious tribe of Carnassiers in the museum of the 

 Garden of Plants, the fossil appeared referrible to one of this 

 family. 



