THE MALTESE FOSSIL ELEPHANTS. 83 
less oblique than in the recent species. With reference to the astragaloid facets, and 
particularly the inner, which is the last to become ossified in the genus, there are seem- 
ingly no differences between the adult recent and the extinct. The figure of Blainville 
showing, as Busk remarks, the inner facet in both the astragalus and calcaneum divided 
into two, in what must have been a full-grown African Elephant, seems an accidental 
irregularity, as that of 708 /, British Museum, shows no division whatever. ‘The dimen- 
sions of fig. 5 ae ars follows :— 
Length 3-9! inches, height 2:7 inches, upper articular surface 2°6 by 3:0 inches, outer 
facet 2°4 inches by 1:3, inner facet 1:9 by 1 inch, peroneal 1-4 by 0°7, cuboidal 2 by 0°8. 
2. The less perfect specimen (8) of the left foot of a somewhat larger individual is 
precisely of the same form, the only determinable difference being a proportionally 
larger fibular facet, which is 1:5 by 1:1. The line of junction of the distal epiphysis is 
here more patent than in the other. 
NAvicuLARE.—By way of comparison between old and young bones so as to enable 
me to determine the following imperfect specimens in my collection, I find, as regards 
the Indian Elephant, that, in common with the other parts of the skeleton, the 
naviculare of the adult has the facets more defined, with adventitious rugosities exter- 
nally, whereas the latter are wanting in young bones. This leads me to divide the 
Maltese nayiculares into old and young, or large and small, of which there are three 
gradations and five specimens. 
The naviculare, like certain other foot-bones, is completely ossified in the Elephant 
at an early age, so that, but for such characters as the above, we might be apt to ascribe 
young bones to the small forms of Elephant; and therefore I feel that much care is 
requisite in determining the two naviculars shown in Pl. XVII. figs. 7 and 8. This is 
not the case, however, with the three larger specimens illustrative of the largest 
Maltese elephant, of which I shall now define the characters of its navicular from 
two (right and left) nearly perfect and one mutilated left specimen from Mnaidra Gap. 
The latter, however, is the largest of the three ; and its characters comply with the data 
just advanced, and indicate an individual fully 7 feet at the withers. The cup shows a 
well-defined brim, with the usual incidental rough exterior of the old bone in contradis- 
tinction to the absence of adventitious surfaces in the young and, perhaps, adolescent 
Elephants. The maximum thickness is 1 inch; the calcaneal facet is 1 by 0°5 inch 
(precisely the same as obtains in the Sumatran, B. M.). From the abraded state of the 
bone, the other facets are not clearly defined ; but, in comparison with the astragals de- 
scribed, this naviculare might have belonged to the largest, and thus somewhat exceeded 
the next, which is represented in Pl. XVII. fig. 1, being one of a pair which seemingly 
belonged to the same individual, as both were met with in very close proximity. 
Indeed, as regards relation, astragalus Pl. XVI. fig. 1 and its compeer of the opposite 
1 As compared with the King’s-College specimen referred to, these two heel-bones are considerably larger ; 
the length of the former is 3:2 inches. 
M2 
