12 NOTE ON ELEPHAS MERIDlONALlS. 



molar is not more than 16. The wide geographical range and long 

 duration as to time of the Mammoth, extending from the Tiber 

 42 north, to the Lena, 70 north, and from Mexico 25 north to 

 Eschscholtz Bay, 66 north, shews a remarkable pliancy and adapta- 

 tion to changes and varieties of climate. The woolly covering 

 which protected the Siberian form probably disappeared from the 

 bodies of those which haunted the southern homes of the species. 

 The adaptation of the molar crowns for the food supplied by 

 countries wide apart from each other, and not specially adapted 

 more for one region than another, gave them facilities for a survival 

 besides a robust constitution, for want of which the other two 

 species failed. 



There are several records of the molars of the Mammoth having 

 been found in this county at Lyme Regis, Blandford, Encombe, 

 and Portland ; also the magnificent scapula, from a gravel bed 

 near the Lidden, which Lord Stalbridge so generously presented to 

 the County Museum last year. 



The tusks of the Mammoth have a double spiral curvature, 

 amounting in some cases to three-fourths pf a circle, with recurved 

 points. The smaller tusk of the two before us shares some of 

 these characters. 



I have dwelt, perhaps, too long upon the general history of this 

 very interesting family, with more special reference to the three 

 British species which have been met with in this county. I now 

 proceed with an account of the Elephantine remains from a remark- 

 able bed reaching over and beyond the summit of a hill overhanging 

 the village of Dewlish, which, with few exceptions, belong to 

 Elepltas nieridionalis. " Hitherto no traces of Elei>lia$ meridional is 

 have been discovered on dry land," so wrote the late Professor 

 Leith Adams in his Monograph on the British Fossil Elephants 

 in 1877 ; sixty years before these words were written, four 

 molars of this rare species were discovered in this bed. The 

 discovery was attributable to the work of an humble field- 

 mouse in the construction of its winter retreat on the side of 

 this barren hill ; the choice was made, perhaps, on account of 



