72 Geological Society :— 
“The importance of the thyroid body must be admitted when it is 
shown to be necessary for the perfection of the voice, and hence of 
speech—that great and indispensable agent in the cultivating and 
advancing the highest faculties of man.” 
GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
[Continued from vol. xiii. p. 533.] 
June 3, 1857.—Col. Portlock, R.E., President, in the Chair. 
The following communication was read :— 
‘‘On the species of Mastodon and Elephant occurring in the 
Fossil state in England.—Part II. Elephants.” By H. Falconer, 
M.D., F.R.S., F.G.S. 
In the introductory portion of Part I. of this Memoir, the author 
alluded to the ambiguity that has existed relative to the mammalian 
faunee of the Miocene and Pliocene periods in consequence of pa- 
leontologists confounding several distinct forms of Mastodon, of 
different geological ages, under one name (M. angustidens); and on 
this occasion Dr. Falconer stated, that, in the application of the name 
Elephas primigenius (Mammoth) to a multitude of elephantine re- 
mains from various superficial and deep deposits, over a vast extent of 
territory, and of different ages, a similar, if not a greater, amount of 
error and confusion had arisen. In fact, at least half the habitable 
globe has been assigned to the Mammoth as his pasture-ground, if 
we were to accept the determinations of all those who have written 
on the remains of Elephas primigenius. ‘The duration, too, of this 
nominal species in time is equally remarkable, so considered; since, 
as it has been quoted from the lower and the upper pliocene beds, 
as well as from the post-pliocene glacial gravels, it ought to have 
existed before the European area received its present geographical 
form, and indeed before the Alps, Apennines, and Pyrenees reached 
their present elevation. After noticing the difficulty met with 
by the geologist in the classification of the newer Tertiaries, on 
account of this ubiquitous presence of the Mammoth, the author 
proceeded to show that several species, belonging to two distinct 
subgenera, have been generally confounded under the name of Ele- 
phas primigenius ; and that each had its limited range in geogra- 
phical area and geological time. The present condition of the 
nomenclature of the subject, and the history of the established 
species of European fossil Elephants, namely Lovodon meridionalis, 
Loxodon priscus, Euelephas antiquus, and Euelephas primigenius, 
preceded an explanation of the principles on which the species are 
determined, and a description of the dental characters by which the 
Elephants are divisible into subgenera,—a succinct account of which 
was given in the former part of the Memoir (vol. xiii. p. 462). The 
‘* intermediate molars’ in Elephants have never less than six divi- 
sions of the crown, and sometimes as many as eighteen. These 
molars do not all have an equal number of ridges: some Elephants 
have an augmentation of only one ridge to the crown of the penul- 
timate of these molars; these are ‘‘ hypisomerous,” namely Stegodon 
