1870. | DR. J. MURIE ON SAIGA TARTARICA. 469 
ridges bound the groove; and in front and behind a pair of large 
prominences or tubercles are developed. In the true Ovine, Cervine, 
and Caprine Antelopes these parts present varied grades of deve- 
lopment. The genus Oreotragus alone has a tendency to flattening, 
and Nemorhedus evinces relative broadening of the bone. 
In the Sheep and the Goats the basilar bone assumes a totally 
different form; it is as broad as it is long, widest in front, flat or 
slightly concave, the posterior tubercles small, and the anterior ones 
extended onwards rather than highly raised. The same bone in the 
Saiga, as previously described, essentially resembles these. 
The Rocky-Mountain Sheep, Ovis montana, offers analogy to the 
Saiga in having an outer mastoidal depression at the root of the 
paramastoid. This, partially, is the condition met with in some 
Oxen ; but in Goats there is a great mastoidal eminence: in the An- 
telopes and Deer it is also convex, but less elevated. 
The Saiga, in the backward extension of its horizontal palatines, 
width of postero-nares, and long, vertically high spheno-pterygoid 
plates, is interesting, as this is not witnessed to the same extent in 
living Ruminantia. The short and higher rounding of its skull is 
also met with in the Chamois, Aipyceros and Damalis. 
There is something peculiar in the dentition; absence of supple- 
méntal lobes separate it from the Cervine Antelopes and all Deer ; 
but the teeth might belong to the Gazelle group, though as closely 
Ovine in character. In its subequal incisors, however, it is unlike the 
antilopine section that have the median ones extra large and expanded 
at the summit. 
Altogether, the cranial anatomy of Saiga tartarica has for its 
groundwork a basioccipital derivatively modelled from Sheep-struc- 
ture ; to this are added mastoid, auditory, and tympanic elements 
modified between those of Antilope and Ovis. The rest of the broad 
basis cranii, palatal region, and the foramina are built typical of Sheep, 
but correlated with change of cranial form. The upward set of the 
basisphenoid and the postcranial contour incline to those of Goats, 
though the glenoid articulation and posterior border of the maxilla 
are truly Antilopine. 
The horns and interfrontals pertain to the latter group in shape ; 
but the diaphanous corneous texture, as the older naturalists did not 
fail to observe, are restrictedly Bovine. Forasmuch as stout abbre- 
viated nasals and preemaxillee indicate family connexion, the Elk and 
Oxen show a tendency to agreement with Saiga; but the facial re- 
gion, notwithstanding, by no means approximates close, and rather, 
in the latter, denotes ancient Sivathere parentage. In fine, the ex- 
traordinary-looking soft structures of the nares and the coordinate 
adaptation of these with deficiency of osseous framework, as in the 
Tapirs and other Pachyderms, point to physiological function of the 
nasal region of a kind different in the extreme from the ordinary 
living Ruminant type. That in by-goue ages kindred proboscidian 
Ruminants were more numerous, and varied concomitantly in cranial 
characteristics, the fossil remains attest. 
