188 PROF, W. H. FLOWER ON THE MUSK-DEER. ([Mar. 16, 
The absence of antorbital glands (generally indicated in the ske- 
leton by the flatness of the facial surface of the lachrymal bone) is 
a general character of the older members of the order, retained in 
some few Deer, many of the Bovide, the Giraffe, and all Tragulina, 
Tylopoda, and Suina. The same is probably the case with the inter- 
digital glands, while the great development of the preputial gland is 
a specialization of the genus Moschus. 
VIII. The brain of the Musk, in its smallness, simplicity of 
surface-markings, and narrowness of the anterior part, indicates a low 
type of the group. It is inferior in these respects to the existing 
Deer, and still more to the Antelopes of corresponding size. 
IX. The peculiar construction of the psalterium probably also in- 
dicates a simple or low type of the group. 
X. I am not quite sure whether it is safe to put any reliance upon 
the character of the hair of the Musk, which is rather an exaggera- 
tion of that found in most Deer. But Antelopes such as Antilocapra, 
and especially Oreotragus saltatriz, show a very similar structure 
in their external covering. The fact of the young Musks being 
spotted (a character so nearly universal in the Deer, and not known 
in any of the other groups) may be some indication of Cervine 
affinity. 
To sum up the position of Moschus, it appears to me to be an 
animal belonging to the stock which remained of the selenodont (or 
crescentic-toothed) Artiodactyles after the Tylopoda and the Tragu- 
lina had been thrown off, and which, by continued modifications of 
the placenta, of the stomach, and other parts, produced the Pecora. 
Of this stock it is a low and little-specialized form, not having the 
characteristic peculiarities of either the Bovide, the Girafide, or 
the Cervide, being probably descended from the stock before either 
of those forms was well established, and having undergone com- 
paratively little modification, though on the whole its affinities are 
nearest to the last-named group. I look upon it as, in the totality 
of its organization, an undeveloped Deer—an animal which in most 
points has ceased to progress with the rest of the group, while in some 
few it has taken a special line of advance of its own. Its position 
will perhaps be better understood by reference to the annexed table, 
in which I have endeavoured to show, only of course in a provisional 
manner, the order in which the principal modifications of the primi- 
tive Artiodactyle type have been brought about. The names of some 
of the best-known extinct forms are inserted to indicate their position 
only approximately ; in the absence of knowledge of their visceral 
anatomy and unfortunately of much of their osteology, greater cer- 
tainty cannot be attained. The primary division of the order into 
Selenodonts, or those having a crescentic arrangement of the pro- 
jections on their molar teeth, and Bunodonts, or those with only 
explain how such organs can become fixed and gradually increase in development 
in any species. If the function suggested above be the correct one, such indiyi- 
duals as by the intensity and peculiarity of their scent had greater power of 
attracting the opposite sex would certainly be those most likely to leave descen- 
dants to inherit and in their tun propagate the modification. 
