Falconer'' s Palceontological Memoirs 233 



The contents of the second volume may conveniently be 

 divided into those papers, &c., which refer to special points in 

 Palaeontology, and those which relate more generally to the question 

 of the antiquity of the human race, and to what Dr Falconer has 

 somewhere termed " Cryptology," but which might more correctly, 

 perhaps, be designated Antrology. A subject which of late years 

 has acquired such gigantic proportions, and is at the present day 

 pursued with such ardour in all parts of Europe. To the former 

 class of papers belong several important and lengthy memoirs on 

 he different species of Mastodon and Elephas, which have been 

 or the most part already published ; whilst among those which are 

 now for the first time printed should be cited the most important 

 perhaps of all the unpublished memoirs left by Dr Falconer — viz., 

 that " On the European pliocene and post-pliocene species of the 

 genus RJiiiioceros." 



It is well known that next to the Proboscidea no class of fossil 

 mammals had attracted so much of Dr Falconer's attention as that 

 of the Rhinoceroses, and as it was generally supposed he had 

 written a good deal on the subject, the publication of his observa- 

 tions was naturally looked forward to by palaeontologists with 

 anxiety and impatience. As regards the later tertiary and the 

 quaternary epochs, no class of mammalian remains is of more im- 

 portance than those belonging to the genus Rhinoceros, whilst at 

 the same time there are none perhaps in whose study such grave 

 difficulties have been encountered \ difficulties, however, arising not 

 so much from the intrinsic conditions of the subject itself as from 

 the almost inextricable confusion into which the synonymy had 

 fallen. No one, it was universally felt, was in a better position to 

 clear up this confusion than Dr Falconer, whose abundant oppor- 

 tunities of investigation at the fountain-head in all parts of Europe, 

 quick powers of discrimination, and accurate judgment, plainly 

 pointed out as the man to undertake the task. In the present 

 paper, which appears to have been drawn up seven or eight years 

 ago, we are presented with a clear and lucid interpretation of much 

 of the vexed synonymy, and furnished with satisfactory distinctive 

 characters of the species which existed in the period above named. 

 Much, it is true, yet remains to be learnt with regard to the ex- 

 tent of distribution and relative ages of the different forms, but a 

 great step towards the solution of these questions has been gained 

 when we can feel tolerably sure of the actual species to which a 

 writer refers. This consummation has now almost been reached 

 through the labours principally of Dr Falconer, his friend Dr 

 Lartet, and Mr Boyd Dawkins. 



R 



