THE MALTESE FOSSIL ELEPHANTS. 71 



portance, seeing that it is rarely entire in recent species until the milk-teeth are shed ' . 

 The entire length is 2 inches, breadth 1'4, ulnar sui-face (antero-posterior diameter) 

 1 by 1-5, unciform (antero-posterior diameter) 1-3 by 1-2, thickness at middle of pisi- 

 form facet 0'8, thickness at middle of lunare aspect 0'4. The narrowness of the border 

 scarcely allows space for an articulating facet. The characters, therefore, of this dimi- 

 nutive wedge-shaped bone are precisely like figs. 8 & 9. It may be remarked that the 

 cuneiform in the very young skeleton in the Oxford University Museum is 2'5 inches. 

 Thus, in proportion, the owner of the above must have been very little over 2 feet in height, 

 and as compared with the very small, yet perfect, foot-bones (PI. XXI. figs. 1-7) shows a 

 still smaller Elephant. The claims of fig. 7 to be considered a mature bone rest, as just 

 stated, on the ossification of its apex and the determined outlines of its facets, neither 

 of which is ever seen in young bones ; and most assuredly ia no other instances of such 

 a small cuneiform are their characters preserved ; indeed, ia examples of those of recent 

 species of double its size we find the' surfaces and apex quite detachable. 



Summary. — From the above it would seem that they represent at all events two 

 distinct forms of cuneiform — one, the larger, assimilating to characters referable to the 

 Asiatic, whilst another has several points, seemingly, in common with the African, 

 the two forms showing much variability as to dimensions. 



PisiPOEM. — In the skeleton no. 2677 a, Eoyal College of Surgeons, to which many of 

 the bones just described bear relative proportions, its pisiform equals the largest 

 (PI. XVIII. fig. 3), but with this difference, that the former has the distal epiphysis 

 detachable, and the same is not only completely consolidated in the fossil but also in 

 the much smaller pisiform, fig. 6. Blainville figures this bone in the African and 

 Asiatic Elephant^ as showing the cuneiform facet triangular and the ulnar horizontal 

 ia the former, whilst in the latter, he states, the first is oval and the second oblique. 

 These distinctions do not appear in the recent specimens I have examined, where the 

 difierences are confined to the general outline of the bone, the Asiatic being more spiral, 

 ■with a large concavity on its posterior aspect — which character is common also to all 

 the Maltese pisiforms, amounting to four perfect and two imperfect specimens. The 

 two largest (right and left), possibly portions of the same animal, were found in con- 

 junction with lunare fig. 1 in Mnaidra Gap. 



1. The left is shown in fig. 3. 



The cuneiform facet is relatively narrower than obtains apparently ia either receat 

 species ; and the outline of the bone is more like the African than the Asiatic, especially 

 in being less hollowed out posteriorly. Again, the ulnar facet is more oblique than in 

 any of the living Elephants. The cuneiform surface is flat and oval, its length is I'l inch, 

 and breadth 1, the ulnar (antero-posterior diameter) beiag I'l by 0-5. This specimeu 

 is also about equal to that of the Sumatran in the British Museum. 



' The apex of this bone in the skeleton no. 707/;, B.ll., is cartilaginous, the bone being 3 by 2-6 inches. 

 ' Atlas, vol. iii. pi. 5. 



