932 REPORT—1843. 
Several bones of a large Ass were associated with the teeth of the Wild 
Boar above mentioned, from the marl beneath the peat formation at Newbury, 
Berks. 
I have been favoured with the following notes of the discovery of fossil 
teeth of a species of Eguus in Ireland, by John Thompson, Esq. of Belfast. 
In sinking a well near Downpatrick, in the county of Down, two teeth were 
found in a stratum of gravel far below the present surface. A tooth was 
found at Newry under similar circumstances. In the county of Antrim teeth 
of the Horse have been found four feet below the surface in drift gravel near 
Belfast, and at the bottom of a turf-bog near Broughshane. 
Order RuMINANTIA. 
Family Bovipz. 
Subgenus Urus*. 
Urus priscus, Fossil Aurochs. 
The former existence of a gigantic species of this subgenus is unequivo- 
cally established by fossil remains of the cranium and horn-cores from various 
newer tertiary freshwater deposits, especially in Kent and Essex. 
One of these specimens was dug out of astratum of dark-coloured clay be- 
low layers of. brick-earth and gravel, thirty feet below the surface, at Wool- 
wich ; it presents the broad convex forehead, the advanced position of the 
horns, which rise three inches anterior to the upper occipital ridge, and the 
obtuse-angled junction of the occipital with the coronal or frontal surface of 
the skull, all which characters distinguish that part of the skeleton of the 
Aurochs. The bony cores of the horns extend outwards, with a slight curva- 
ture upwards: from the mid-line between their bases to the extremity of one 
core, in a straight line, measures 2 feet 5 inches. 
Another specimen of the fossil cranium of the Urus, dug out of a brick- 
field at Ilford in Essex, presents, with the same essential characters as the 
preceding, relatively thicker, shorter and more curved horn-cores. This fossil 
in the shorter horns differs from the preceding, as the American Bison or Ass 
differs from the European Aurochs; but in the absolute length of the horns 
it resembles the European Aurochs: it may indicate the female Urus priscus. 
A broken skull with perfect horn-cores of the Urus priscus, discovered by 
Mr. Strickland in the freshwater drift at Cropthorne, Worcestershire, yields 
the following dimensions: from tip to tip of the horn-cores, following the 
anterior curves, 3 feet 8 inches; the same in a straight line, 3 feet 4 inches. 
Hitherto no fossil skeleton of the same individual has been discovered in a 
state of such completeness as to enable the anatomist to ascertain the number 
of the ribs; a fact which would be of singular importance in determining the 
relations of the ancient British Aurochs, since the European existing Wild 
Aurochs has fourteen pairs, and the American Aurochs or Bison has fifteen 
pairs, whilst all the varieties of Ox and Buffalo have but thirteen pairs of ribs. 
The number of the true vertebra is however the same in all the Bovine ani- 
mals, the costal or dorsal being increased at the expense of the lumbar series 
in the subgenus Urus. Cuvier expresses his opinion of the importance of a 
precise knowledge of the formations containing remains of the great fossil 
Aurochs, and regrets that the information on this point is somewhat vague. 
The brick-earth from which the two specimens of fossil Aurochs above-cited 
were found, underlies a layer of sand with pebbles and concretions, containing 
shells of Unio and Cyclas; and the remains of both Mammoth and Rhinoceros 
are unquestionably associated with those of the Aurochs in this formation. 
The other localities which may be cited, from the less certain character of the 
* Bos Urus, Linn., but not the Urus of the ancients, which Cuvier regards as the true 
original of our domestic cattle. 
