261 



PALAEONTOLOGY. 

 1. VERTEBRATA. 



Adams, Prof. A. Leith. On the Dentition and Osteology of the 

 Maltese FossU Elephants, being a description of remains dis- 

 covered by the Author in Malta between the years 1860 and 

 1866. Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. ix. pt. 1, pp. 1-124, plates i.-xxii. 



The ossiferous caves and fissures of Malta are enumerated. For 

 geological details the author's ' Natural History and Archseology of 

 the Nile Yalley and Maltese Islands ' (1870) may be consulted. The 

 bones occur chiefly in clays and conglomerates with waterworn pet* 

 bles, and in most cases appear to have been transported by water to 

 their present position. Hence they are scattered, fragmentary, and 

 often much abraded. Some of the elephant-remains exhibit traces of 

 gnawing. The author considers that the remains are divisible into 

 two species, both allied to Loxodon meridionalis, viz. ElejpJias mnai- 

 driensis, n. sp., and E. melitensis, to which latter E. Falconeri is, with 

 some hesitation, referred, as a small variety. E. mnaidriensis attained 

 a height of 6|-7 feet. Nearly the entire dentition and many bones 

 are now known. The ridge-formula is : — Milk-Molars, 5:8: 10-11 ; 

 True Molars, 10-11 : 12 : 14-15. The crown-sculpture of the 

 tooth allies this species to E. antiquus ; most of the long bones show' 

 affinity with Loxodon afiicanus. E. melitensis had an average height 

 of nearly 5 feet ; the var. Falconeri is occasionally as low as 3 feet. 

 The ridge-formula is: — Milk-Molars, 5 : 7:10-11; True Molars, 

 10-11 : 12 : 14. With these, bones and teeth of Hippopotamus 

 Pentlandi and H. minutns occur, besides giant dormice and a large 

 extinct Swan, which have not yet been found out of Malta. There 

 are also undescribcd bones of lleptiles. The details of the osteology 

 and dentition are worked out, and illustrated by plates, mostly of 

 natural size. L. C. M. 



Concluding Report on the Maltese Fossil Elephants. Rep. 



Brit. Assoc, for 1873, pp. 185-187. 

 For the most part a summary of the foregoing. The evidence of 

 the ossiferous caves and of the deposits containing remains of elephants 

 leads the author to suppose that " the eastern basin of the Mediter- 

 ranean had been at one time a common ground where all these extinct 

 and living elephants met, and whence, with other animals, they have 

 disappeared or been repelled to distant regions." L. C. M. 



Agassiz, L. Three difl'erent modes of teething among Selachians. 

 Amer. Nat. vol. viii. pp. 129-135. 



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