t 
q 
THE AMERICAN BISONS. Zo 
3. Fragment from California (Whitney’s Coll.), 18 mm. long, — portion extending from the inner angle 
to the front edge of first molar. 
4, Fragment from California. (National Museum Coll.) 
5. Georgia specimen. (Measurements in part from Harlan, and in part from Owen’s figure.) 
In the National Museum at Washington there is still another fragment of 
a lower jaw (No. 8270 of the National Museum Register), consisting of a 
large part of one ramus, from Alameda County, California, presented by Dr. 
L. G. Yates.* This specimen is of about the size of the larger of the two 
California specimens already described. 
Dr. Harlan’s measurements of the Georgia specimen, determined by aid - 
of Prof. Owen’s figure,ft are also added to the table. As already stated, it 
indicates a species as large as Bison antiquus, the jaw being heavier and 
thicker even than in the largest known specimen of that species. The 
length of the molar series seems, however, a little less, but this measure- 
ment can be only approximately determined. 
Of the metacarpal bones of Bison antiquus but a single specimen is 
known. This was collected by Mr. J. Lockhart, and is contained in the 
National Museum at Washington. It is about one tenth longer than the 
largest metacarpal of Bison americanus I have been able to find, and is rela- 
tively much stouter. It is also rather longer and stouter than the corre- 
sponding part in a very large old male Bison bonasus. It hence about 
equals the size of this part in Bison priscus: In Table VII will be found 
measurements of this bone as compared with those of the corresponding 
part in Bison americanus (male and female), Bison bonasus (male), and of a 
large domestic bull. 
Having at hand a large series of metacarpal bones of Bison americanus, I 
add here a table of measurements showing the range of variation in this 
part, resulting from age, sex, and individual differentiation, found in a 
series of nearly a hundred specimens. This series shows that some of the 
specimens belonging to females are as long as the average of the males, and 
* Since the foregoing was put in type I have received a letter from Dr. Yates, dated “ Centreville, Ala- 
meda Co., Cal., Jan. 29, 1876,” announcing the recent discovery by him of another skull of the fossil bison in 
California, He says: ‘I found a splendid specimen last week which I shall preserve. It consists of the 
skull, with three molar teeth on one side, and the greater portion of the horn-cores. It was so soft that I 
had to bed it in plaster before I could take it out.” He adds that “the skull was found in post-pliocene 
gravel, about ten feet from the spot where I found the skull of a fossil elephant some ten years ago, and in 
the same deposit where I have found Mastodon, Equus, Auchenia, etc.” 
t Journ, Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 2d Ser., Vol. I, pl. vi. 
