NOTES ON THE CANID® OF THE WHITE RIVER OLIGOCENE. 403 
“Les belles récherches de M. Filhol nous ont révélé la richesse en especes de ces 
genres si curieux, placés aux confins de plusieurs familles de Carnassiers. Les Cynodic- 
tis et les Cephalogale avaient la formule dentaire des Chiens actuels, mais leurs dents 
presentaient un aspect particulier qui a yalu a ces animaux fossiles le nom de Chiens 
viverriens. Or en ¢tudiant les pieces originales de la collection du Muséum et les livres 
de M. Filhol sur les Phosporites du Quercy, j’ai été frappé de retrouyer, comme parsemés 
dans diverses especes de Cynodictis beaucoup des characteres présentés par le Canis mega- 
mastoides ” (p. 328). 
“Tl semble done que les Renards actuels représentent une branche emanée du buis- 
son touffer des Cynodictis, duquel se serait également detachée la branche des Viverridés. 
Je suppose que lorsqu’ on connaitra suffisament les membres des diverses espéces de Cyno- 
dictis, on trouvera des formes de passage allant d’un cété aux membres des Viverridés et 
Wun autre c6té aux membres des Renards. 
“Si ces considerations sont exactes, les Chiens ont une origine differente des Renards. 
Les Amphicyons représentent les anecétres communs des Ours et des Chiens, comme les 
Cynodictis représentent les ancétres communs des Ciyettes et des Renards ” (p. 329). 
M. Boule’s argument as to the derivation of the foxes from Cynodictis is not a very 
convincing one and is open to several obyious objections. In the first place, M. Boule does 
not define the sense in which he uses the term fox ; it is evidently. not the same as Hux- 
ley’s alopecoid, for C. canerivorus and C. azare are called foxes, while Huxley regarded 
them as typical though primitive thooids. M. Boule does not say whether C. megamas- 
toides possessed a frontal sinus, but from the statement that “le frontal est saillant, 4 sur- 
face arrondie” (pp. 324, 525), one would infer the presence of a sinus, and if so, CL mega- 
mastoides is not an alopecoid, but a thooid. The presence or absence of frontal sinuses 
and the shape of the cerebral fossa are the only diagnostic characters which Huxley could 
find definitely distinguishing the two canine series from each other. In the second place, 
the resemblances in tooth structure between Cynodictis and Canis megamastoides, upon 
which M. Boule places such emphasis, are in themselves of no great value, because the 
resemblance of the latter species to Cephalogale is eyen greater, and Cephalogale, as 
Schlosser has shown, probably belongs in a totally different line, which has no existing 
representatives. In any event, the gap between the Pliocene and Oligocene forms is 
still so wide that no determination of the taxonomic value of their resemblances and 
differences can yet be made. 
Again, it is highly improbable that the yiverrines can be descended from Cynodictis, 
for the latter, though having certain marked resemblances to the civets, is in all essen- 
tials of structure distinctly a member of the Canid@, and is no more ancient than cer- 
tain unmistakable viverrines. Indeed, the genus Viverra itself is reported from the 
