Discovery of a fossil Walrus in Virginia. 271 



Discovery of a Fossil Walrus in Virginia. Report of 

 Messrs. Mitchill, J. A. Smith, and Cooper, on a fossil 

 skull sent to Dr. Mitchill by Mr. Cropper of Accomac 

 County, Virginia. Read August 7, 1827. 



The fossil from Accomac county, Virginia, exhibited to 

 the Society at a late session, is the anterior portion of the 

 cranium of a species of Morse, or Walrus. 



It comprises the entire sockets of the two great tusks, the 

 palatine and maxillary bones, with the sockets of eight molar 

 teeth ; and the bony isthmus, which in this animal, connects 

 these parts with the true skull containing the brains. Both 

 the tusks remain, though much mutilated. Four of the 

 molars are also left, and one other has but recently dropped 

 out. From the appearance of the three remaining sockets, 

 the teeth must have been lost out of them at a very distant 

 period, and probably during the life of the animal. 



The skull is remarkably hard and heavy, and no sutures 

 are visible, except between the palatine bones. The tusks 

 have become almost agatized, and their fracture is conchoidal, 

 presenting a very smooth surface, and a flinty color and con- 

 sistence. 



This fragment bears the greatest resemblance to the analo- 

 gous part in the existing species, Trichechus rosmarus, of 

 whose osteology such admirable figures are given by Cuvier, 

 in the fifth volume of the Recherches sur les Ossemens Fossiles. 

 The extraordinary enlargement of the muzzle, caused by the 

 great size of the canine sockets, and the peculiar disposition 

 of the molars, between the canine teeth, instead of posterior 

 to them as in other mammalia, render it impossible for any 

 person who has had an opportunity of consulting that pro- 

 found work, to mistake this genus for any other. 



Dr. Mitchill hopes yet to succeed in obtaining an exact 

 description of the locality where it was discovered. It bears 



