4j98 original articles. 



have been domesticated by these savages, and the condition of the 

 bones themselves confirms the idea that they belonged to wild animals. 

 The sheep and the reindeer being entirely absent, and the domestic 

 cat not having been known in Europe until about the ninth century, 

 the dog appears to have been the only domestic animal of the period ; 

 and though it may fairly be asked whether the bones may not have 

 belonged to a race of wild dogs, the question admits of a satisfactory 

 answer. 



Among the remains of birds, the long bones which form about 

 one-fifth of the skeleton are, in the Kjokkenmoddings, about twenty 

 times as numerous as the others, and are almost always imperfecta 

 the shaft only remaining. In the same manner it would be impos- 

 sible to reconstruct a perfect skeleton of the quadrupeds, certain 

 bones and parts of bones being always absent. In the case of the ox, 

 for instance, the missing parts are the heads of the long bones 

 (though while the shaft only of the femur is found, in the humerus 

 one end is generally perfect), the back bone except the two first 

 vertebra?, the spinous processes, and generally the ribs, and the bones 

 of the skull except the lower jaw and the portion round the eyes. 

 It occurred to M. Steenstrup that these curious facts might, per- 

 haps, be referred to the dogs; and, on trying the experiment, he 

 ascertained that the bones which are absent from the Kjokken- 

 moddings are precisely those which the dogs eat, and those which 

 are present are the parts which are too hard and solid to contain 

 much nourishment. M. Steenstrup called my attention to a dia- 

 gram of a bird's skeleton, tinted in such a manner as to show at a 

 glance which of the bones occur in the Kjokkenmoddings, and pointed 

 out to me that it coincided exactly with one given by M. Serres 

 to illustrate those portions of the skeleton which were first formed. 



Although a glance at, for instance, a femur, and a comparison of 

 the open cancellated tissue of the two ends with the solid, close, 

 texture of the shaft, at once justifies and accounts for the selection 

 made by the dogs, it is interesting thus to ascertain that their predi- 

 lections were the same in primaeval times as at present. Moreover, 

 we may in this manner explain the prevalence of some bones in fossil 

 strata, I have already mentioned that of the skull, the hard parts 

 round the eye and the lower jaw are the only parts left ; now, the 

 preponderance of lower jaws in a fossil state is well known. 



In the " Proceedings of the Greological Society for 1857," p. 277, 

 Dr. Falconer, after describing some of the fossils found by Mr. 

 Beccles at Swanage, says : — " The curious fact that only lower jaws 

 " should have turned up among the Stonesfield mammalian remains 

 " has often been the subject of speculation or remark. The same, to 

 " a certain extent, has held good with the remains found in the 



" Purbeck beds In these minute creatures, unless the bone 



" be complete, and, supposing it to be a long bone, with both its 

 " articular surfaces perfect, it is almost hopeless, or at any rate very 

 " discouraging, to attempt to make out the creature that yielded it ; 

 " whereas the smallest fragment of a jaw, with a minute tooth in it, 



