THE MALTESE FOSSIL ELEPHANTS, 45 
equal to those of an Asiatic Elephant’s lower jaw holding the second true molar in 
full wear. 
Summary.—The above data with regard to the cranium support the inferences drawn 
from a study of the molars. As regards characters, it seems that the posterior contour 
of the lower jaw, in the smaller form at all events, partook much of that of the African, 
but was similar to the Asiatic in the chin, which was truncated, with a high diasteme, 
and scarcely any rostrum. As regards dimensions, if the comparison between the jaws 
and recent species is of any value, it appears that the lower mandible of the smaller 
form attained the dimensions of that of the Asiatic where the last milk-molar is in full 
wear, and that the lower mandible of the largest form often equalled that of a full- 
grown but small individual of the recent Elephants holding the second true molar, 
which would ordinarily give a height of nearly 5 feet to the former, and about 7 feet to 
the latter. 
III. Sryio-Hyo1p. 
A remarkably interesting specimen, to all appearance of an adult state of growth, is 
represented by Pl. XV. fig. 10 (natural size). It is the left stylo-hyoid of a very small 
elephant, and was found in Benghisa Gap.. As compared with similar bones of the 
recent species in the British Museum and Royal College of Surgeons, the above differs 
widely in dimensions. Of a skeleton of the Asiatic Elephant, No. 707/ of the Osteo- 
logical Catalogue of the British Museum, where the last milk-molar is in full wear, 
and the tusk protruding 7 inches beyond the alveolus, the entire length is 5-5 inches; 
the cranial facet is 0°5 by 0-2 inch, the latter in fig. 10 being 0:5 by 0°3 inch. The 
greatest breadth of fig. 10 at a is 0-7, that of the above being 1 inch. Altogether in 
comparison there is a marked difference in dimensions; and when we know that fig. 10 
could not have belonged to a fcetal individual, it will be conceded that its owner must 
have been a diminutive form of Elephant. ‘The specimen differs from the two instances 
above recorded in the prominence of the ridge at a, the relatively shorter neck at 6, a 
larger cranial facet, and the rounding of the long arm, which is flat in the Asiatic 
Elephant. 
IV. VERTEBRAL CoLuMN. 
The mature bones referable to the vertebral column are divisible into two groups 
easily determinable on the score of size. I shall describe only such as indicate by the 
complete consolidation of epiphyses that they belonged to adult, if not aged, elephants. 
1. The only specimen of an atlas is represented in Pl. XIII. figs. 1, la, & 16, which, 
in comparison with the fragments in the Zebbug collection, assigned by Busk to the 
Elephas melitensis and E. falconeri, gives the following data. I have also placed in the 
Table measurements of the atlas of a very young Asiatic Elephant, by way of contrast, - 
to show the diminutive dimensions of the owners of the Maltese atlases. 
