234 REPORT—1843. 
The most complete skull of the Bos primigenius is that of which the dis- 
covery is recorded in the Bath and Cheltenham Gazette for June 26, 1838. 
The specimen was obtained from the bed of the river Avon, at Melksham, 
Wilts, and it gives a distinctive character of the present subgenus which 
could not be deduced from the former specimens on account of their fractured 
state, viz. the greater length of the frontal region in proportion to its breadth, 
as compared with that part of the skull of the Urus. 
Cuvier states with regard to fossil remains of the Bos primigenius, “il 
s’en trouve en Angleterre,” apparently on the authority of drawings trans- 
mitted to him by Mr. Crow. 
Mr. Parkinson* refers his specimens of Bovine fossils dug up in Dumfries- 
shire to the Bos primigenius, but without assigning the grounds for this 
choice. Cuvier himself devotes a distinct section to the detached fossil 
bones of the trunk and extremities of the Bovine tribe, expressing his regret 
at the numerous sources of uncertainty and difficulty attending their deter- 
mination when unassociated with the skull ; whilst he acknowledges the great 
importance of ascertaining the species of Bovide to which the bones from 
each stratum belonged ; whether, for example, an Aurochs, an Ox, or a Buf- 
falo had been the companion of the Elephants, Rhinoceroses, &c. which for- 
merly lived in climates of Europe. At the period of the publication of the 
second edition of the ‘Ossemens Fossiles’ (1823), no authentic example had 
been recorded of a cranium of either Urus priscus or Bos primigenius in 
strata containing bones of the Mammoth and Rhinoceros ; and this statement 
is repeated in the posthumous edition of the ‘Ossemens Fossiles,’ 8vo, 1835. 
The two examples above cited of crania of the Urus priscus from newer 
pliocene freshwater deposits in Kent and Essex, leave no reasonable doubt 
that a large Aurochs was the associate of the gigantic Pachyderms, whose re- 
presentatives at the present day have the Buffalos for their companion in the 
tropical swamps and forests. It is true that species of true Bos are found 
wild in the warmer parts of Asia; but no true Aurochs has been discovered 
within the tropics. The great fossil Urus was likewise associated with as 
large a species of Bos in England during the period antecedent to the de- 
position of the drift. 
To determine to which subgenus of Bovide detached teeth, vertebra, 
ribs and other bones of the skeleton belonged, is still attended with much 
difficulty ; such remains, however, sufficiently attest that species as large as 
the Urus priscus and Bos primigenius were very extensively distributed 
throughout England: they have been found in almost all the drift and cave 
localities, and in the newer tertiary deposits that have been cited in the fore- 
going part of the present report as yielding the fossil remains of Elephas; 
Rhinoceros, Hyena and Ursus. 
Cuvier} affirms, as the result of his numerous comparisons of the recent 
and fossil bones of the Bovine animals, that the detached bones resemble each 
other too much to yield certain specific characters, and that it is necessary to 
have skulls in order to determine the species. I have however noticed a cha- 
racter in a few fossil metatarsal bones of different sizes from the cavernous 
fissures at Oreston, and from the freshwater tertiary deposits in Essex, which 
I have not observed or found recorded in any known existing species of the 
Bovine family, and which would serve easily and unequivocally to determine 
the fossil species if once these bones could be found in such connexion or 
juxtaposition with a cranium as to justify the conclusion that they belonged 
to the same skeleton with such cranium. At present, unfortunately, this 
link, essential to a reference of the bones in question to their true subgenus, 
is wanting, and I can only cite them with a notice of the peculiar character 
* Organic Remains, vol. iii, p. 325. + Ossem. Foss, iy. p. 140. 
