Tertiary.-] PALJEONTOLOGY OF VICTORIA. [Mammalia. 



corresponding tooth of the living Dingo, or perhaps slightly thicker. The third 

 premolar (p. 3) is 6 lines long, 2^ lines wide, and exactly agrees with the living one 

 in size and shape, having two small cusps behind the principal one and a slight 

 thickening at the anterior end. The great sectorial premolar (p. 4) is 9 lines long 

 and 6 lines wide in front where the tubercle is developed from the inner side of the 

 base of the anterior or principal cusp ; I see no difference between this, as far as 

 preserved, and the corresponding tooth, of the living Dingo. The first upper molar 

 (m. 1) is 5 lines long along the two outer cusps, and 8 lines wide across the 

 subtuberculate low, broad, internal talon, agreeing completely with the tooth of the 

 living types. In the same cave were several young skulls of different ages with the 

 milk teeth unshed ; the anterior portion of one of these is represented in our plate, 

 fig. 1. These accord exactly with skulls and teeth of similarly young individuals of 

 the Dingo with which I have compared them ; the greater space between the 1st, 

 2nd, and 3rd premolars, and the relatively smaller size of the teeth and the more 

 acute narrow cusps, agree exactly with cubs of the living Dingo. 



REFERENCE. Canis dingo, Blumenbach Handbuch, p. 103 ;= C. familiar is, 

 Australasia, Desm. Mam., p. 190. 



The origin of the domestic Dog is a question of great difficulty 

 and interest, which it has been suggested could be best investigated 

 by a study of the Dog known to the lowest types of the human race ; 

 and the aboriginal natives of Australia and the Dingo were thought 

 to afford these conditions. On the other hand, the remarkable 

 absence of the higher orders of mammalian quadrupeds in Australia 

 was supposed to render it highly probable that the Dingo, or 

 Australian Dog, was not really a native of the place, but was 

 brought at some remote period from some other country by human 

 savage races arriving to constitute the population of Australia. 

 Taking the case of the Dingo, it was certain that the native Dogs 

 of continental Asia were not clearly related, to the extent of specific 

 identity, with the Australian one, nor could any near analogues be 

 found anywhere ; while, on the other hand, the facts are beyond 

 dispute : 1st, that the Dingo is singularly averse to domestication 

 and man's society when compared with other dogs ; 2nd, that it is 

 extremely abundant, with little or no variation, over the whole of 

 Australia ; and 3rd, that the farther you go from human haunts, 

 near the coast, into the desert interior, the more numerous do the 

 Dingoes appear, indicating that the species was a really indigenous 

 one. 



The announcement, many years ago, of my recognition of 

 bones and teeth of the Dingo in the Pliocene Tertiary strata of 

 Colac, and other Victorian localities, in company with similarly 



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