390 SOLIPEDIA. 



Cuvier has given most excellent figures of the principal 

 bones of the existing Horse, in the volume cited of the 

 ' Ossemens Fossiles, 1 plates i. and iii. Amongst the most 

 recognisable ones are the astragalus (fig. 153), and the last 

 phalanx, which is enveloped by the hoof, called by farriers 

 the * coffin-bone' (fig. 154). The thigh-bone is distin- 

 guished from that of any Ruminant of the same size by 

 the flattened process from the outer side of the shaft below 

 the great trochanter ; and the Horse thereby manifests its 

 affinity to the Rhinoceros and Palseothere. 



Mr. Fitch of Norwich has a lower molar tooth of a 

 Horse three and a half inches in length, and a metacarpal 

 or cannon bone ten inches long, with one of the splint-bones 

 anchylosed to it ; both are from Pliocene deposits in 

 Norfolk. 



The largest bone of an extremity of a fossil Horse which 

 I have seen, is a second phalanx from the upper pliocene 

 deposits at Walton-on-Naze, Essex, where it was dis- 

 covered by Mr. Brown of Stan way ; it measures two 

 inches eight lines in extreme breadth, and two inches four 

 lines in length. The corresponding bones from Oreston are 

 smaller. Mr. Brown has also found remains of a Horse 

 associated with those of the Rhinoceros leptorhinus, Elephas 

 and Urus, in the fresh-water deposits at Clacton, in 

 Essex. Remains of the Equusfossilis have been discovered, 

 similarly associated with larger extinct Pachyderms, in the 

 pliocene formations at Audley End, by the Hon. R. C. 

 Neville. The wide distribution of the fossil Horse over the 

 surface of this island, in the pliocene and later deposits, is 

 indicated by the citations at the commencement of this 

 section. 



I have been favoured with the following notes of the 

 discovery of fossil teeth of a species of Equus in Ireland, by 



