174 KANSAS UNIVERSITY QUARTERLY. 



Machserodus crassidens CJragiii. (Plate XIX.) 



In Science for January 8, 1892, Professor Cragin described from 

 the Loup Fork of Kansas the canine of a sabre-tooth cat uncier the 

 name of MacJuerodus crassidois. In the University collection there 

 are a number of large felid bones from the same deposit in Phillips 

 County whence Cragin obtained his specimen, and among them there 

 is a large canine which seems indentical with his. I copy below the 

 measurements given by Cragin (reduced to millimeters), and in the 

 second column give the corresponding measurements for our speci- 

 men: 



Breadth of crown at base 28 .... 30 



Thickness of same 20.. ..18 



Breadth of crown 37 mm. above base, about 20 ... . 



Thickness of crown at same place 11.... 



Length of root of crown to origin of denticulated keel. ... 61 ... .60 

 Length of canine as restored, approximately 132 ... . 



The anterior part of the tooth in the present as in Cragin's speci- 

 men is worn or broken away, so that it cannot be said whether there 

 was an anterior denticulation or not. On the posterior border there 

 are twelve denticulations in five millimeters. 



With this tooth there were found a number of other felid bones 

 belonging to at least two different species. One of them is of almost 

 the size of the lion {Felis leo), though more slender, and it 

 seems very probable that the humerus, radius and metatarsals figured 

 in plate XIX belong to the same species, it is not at all unlikely, with 

 the tooth described above. They may, hence, be provisionally known 

 by the name of Machcerodus crassidens Cragin, though of course it 

 is not certain at all that the genus may not prove to be something 

 else. In the Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology, xx. 

 No. 2i2)i November, 1890, Professor Scott figured and named a large 

 humerus from the Loup Fork of Kansas, under the name (?) Felis 

 iiiaxinia. The figures given by him show a striking resemblance to 

 the humerus here figured, the other two views of which are given. 

 But the differences in measurement preclude the possibility of their 

 both belonging to the same species, F. maxima being at least one- 

 fourth larger. Scott referred the humerus to Felis because of the 

 entepicondylar foramen, and not to Smilodon. However, I believe 

 that Smilodon necator, the species he mentions, is the only known 

 felid in which this foramen is absent, so that there is no objection to 

 placing it in either Smilodon or Machcerodus. In the following 

 measurements, I copy those given by Scott of Smilodon necator and 

 Felis ?naxima. The measurements of Felis leo are taken from the 

 skeleton of a male nearly adult in the University Museum: 



