152 RELIQUIAE AQUITAOTCLE. 



figure among the numerous Herbivores of the caverns of Lunel-Viel (H^rault), 

 described by MM. Marcel de Serres, Dubreuil, and Jeanjean*. In opposition, 

 however, to these negative coincidences, each of those three caves contains remains 

 of Rhinoceros Merkii, the sole species of the genus which has been there observed 

 up to the present time. It is well known that Rh. Merkii existed in that district 

 of France from the earliest part of the Pliocene Period ; for fragments, sufficiently 

 characteristic, have been collected in the fluvio-marine sands of Montpellier, where 

 they were mixed with remains of Mastodons, Apes, and other Mammals of the 

 same epoch. 



" Now what can be inferred from the absence of Reindeer from these south- 

 eastern caverns ? Must it be believed that, at that ancient epoch, this part of the 

 Mediterranean coast was, as at present, favoured by an exceptional climate, too 

 warm to allow of the existence of Reindeer ? Or would it be better to suppose 

 that the infilling of these caverns, that of Mars for example, which M. Bour- 

 guignat calculates to have taken place in his ' fifth epoch,' was in reality anterior 

 in date to the appearance of Reindeer in Quaternary Europe ? Let us hope 

 that M. Bourguignat's further researches in this Mars cavern will supply him 

 with more complete materials to elucidate the question from the one or the other 

 point of view." 



* "Eecherches sur les casements humatiles des cavernes de Lunel-Viel: 1834." 



