Nova Acta Academi(2 Naturce Curiosorum. 371 



figured and described by Collini, in the " Acta Academise Theodoro- 

 *' Palatinae" for 1784, with a recent skull of the HyeBna Crocuta. From 

 this comparison he concludes that the recent and fossil species can scarcely 

 be distinguished from each other ; an inference strengthened by a similar 

 comparison of a fossil bear's skull from Gailenreuth with a recent one 

 from Lithuania, and of a portion of the fossil lower jaw of a wolf from the 

 same Cavern with a recent lower jaw from Saltzburg, " There existed 

 " therefore, he says, " in the primitive world, a species of Hygena, of 

 " Bear, and of Wolf, which can with difficulty be distinguished from 

 " living species of those genera." 



The authour next proceeds to compare the skull which forms the 

 immediate subject of his paper with that of Collini, and finds that it 

 belongs, as Cuvier had previously remarked, to a distinct species, Hycena 

 fossilis or spelcEa; the distinguishing characters between which and the 

 other hyaenas, both recent and fossil, are stated to consist in the greater 

 shortness of its facial when compared with, its cerebral portion, the 

 greater prominence of its forehead, and its general colossal stature. Its 

 substance is carefully investigated, and it is shewn to have belonged to an 

 adult and probably an aged individual. The nature of the wound and 

 the mode of its reparation are then considered at length, and illustrated 

 by valuable observations with regard to the formation of callus, and the 

 other stages of union in the bones both of men and animals. By the 

 application of the principles thus obtained to the fossil in question, it is 

 shewn, as might indeed have been conjectured a priori, that in the 

 primitive world the union of broken bones in the Mammalia was pro- 

 duced in the same manner as at the present day. Then follow the 

 authour's reasons for believing the injury to have resulted from the bite 

 of a hyaena; and the paper concludes with the expression of a belief 

 that the fossil hyaena to which this skull belonged had its primitive abode 

 at no great distance from the place where its remains were found after 

 some thousands of years; and vnth a retractation of the early opinion 

 of the authour, founded on imperfect data, that the fossil remains found 

 in the Gailenreuth cave had been deposited there by the hands of man. 



M. Constantin Gloger's Memoir *' Ueber den Nestbau der Zwergmaus 

 &c." contains the description of two very different nests, in each of 



