THREE EXTINCT SPECIES OF ELEPHANT. 287 
“ De Blainville (‘ Ostéographie,’ Eléphans, pl. ix. fig. 1) has given a figure of a lower 
jaw of a very young African Elephant, in which a pre-antepenultimate or theoretical 
first milk-molar was developed on one side of the lower jaw ; and in the ‘ Fauna Antiqua 
Sivalensis’ another example of the same kind is also figured*. ‘The milk-tooth in both 
these cases was very rudimentary ; and it is possible that the Zebbug specimen might be 
conjectured to be an equivalent tooth. But it appears to me that this view is distinctly 
negatived by the fact that the Zebbug milk-molar was supported upon a large fang, and 
that its crown is well worn, proving that it had served an alimentary function, and that 
it was not a case of unusual or monstrous development of a theoretical tooth which is 
commonly suppressed. In the instances of the African Elephant above referred to, the 
pre-antepenultimate milk-molar was restricted to one side of the lower jaw, and was not 
developed in the upper jaw. It is difficult to say of the Malta tooth whether it 
belonged to the upper or lower jaw. 
“Fig. 3 of the same plate represents the portion of the crown borne upon the large 
anterior fang of a milk-molar. It is composed of three distinct disks of wear, which 
are very open, resembling in this respect the characters yielded by fig. 2; indeed they 
are as much expanded as in the existing African Elephant. The crown is narrow in 
front, and widens very rapidly backwards, the dimensions being :— 
in. 
Width in front (of anterior ridge) .................0.0c00e 0-5 
Gueatestividthy behind): seis -steset celotheted.. seh-ladetoa ss 0-5 
Length of crown-fragment (of three front disks) ...... 0-54 
“The anterior end of the fragment bears halfway up a distinct smooth pit, being the 
disk of pressure against an anterior tooth that had been in contact with it. The enamel 
plates surrounding the worn disks show no marks of crimping. It is not possible to say 
what was the precise number of ridges entering into the composition of the crown of 
this tooth; but judging from a germ specimen, to be described in the sequel, it con- 
belonged to a diminutive species. It is a curious circumstance, however, and one well worthy of note with 
respect to this tooth, that its fangs must have differed widely from those of the second milk-molar in all other 
known instances, in which they are subequal in size and strongly divergent. Dr. Falconer states that there is 
some indication of the existence of a distinct small anterior fang—though I am myself by no means satisfied of 
this, but on the contrary conceive that the existing fang, as shown in the figure, is in fact composed of two con- 
nate ones. In any case it is obvious that, even had an anterior fang existed, it must have been very much 
smaller than the posterior ; and it is equally clear, from the direction of the remaining fang, that they were not 
divergent. Another circumstance, however, goes strongly to show that the existing fang is really a double one. 
In the fcetal mandible, represented in fig. 45, the alveoli of a small tooth immediately in front of the third milk- 
molar remain; and of one of these I have taken a wax cast of the interior, which shows that the fangs of the 
tooth occupying it were also connate and non-divergent. From this circumstance, if confirmed by further 
instances, it would seem probable, either that the true second milk-molar, in at least one of the pigmy Elephants, 
had connate, non-divergent fangs, or (what is perhaps equally probable) that that tooth was normally suppressed 
and replaced by a functionally developed first milk-molar. 
* Pl. xiv. fig. 4, left side, a. 
