QUATEENAET FAUNA OF GIBEALTAK. 71 



The ouly difference in the fourth metacarpal is the greater compression of the shaft 

 in the Gibraltar bone. 



The first metatarsal is of exactly the same length as that of Tl.ferox; and the only 

 difference between the two is that in the Gibraltar bone the proximal articular surface 

 is broader and less produced at the inner and posterior angle. 



As regards TI. arctos, as the only metacarpals belonging to that species that I have 

 been able to compare with the Gibraltar bones and those of U. ferox are from a young 

 individual, and in which the epiphyses are not fully completely united, though nearly 

 so, I am not able to say more, making allowance for their much smaller size, than 

 that they appear in the compression of the shaft of the fourth and fifth, and in the 

 comparatively small size of the distal capitulum, to bear a very close resemblance to the 

 Gibraltar bones ^. 



Doubt being thus left as to which, if either, of the two generally recognized forms 

 above noticed the Gibraltar species should be referred to, it will be interesting to recall 

 the circumstance of the discovery, about the year 1866 or 1867, by M. Bourguignat, 

 in a cavern at Djebel-Thaya, in the province of Constantine, in Algeria, of abundant 

 ursine remains, which were considered by him to belong to four distinct species, dif- 

 fering considerably, as it M'ould appear, not only in size, but also in the relative pro- 

 portions of the bones of the extremities, the teeth, &c. 



The first published notice of this discovery appeared in 1867 2, in which a brief 

 description is given of a form upon which M. Bourguignat has bestowed the name of 

 U. faidherhianus, founding his diagnosis, however, solely upon the lower teeth. In the 

 next year he published the discovery, in the same cavern, of three more forms, to 

 which he assigns the rank of species, viz. TJ. lartetianus, letourneuxianus, and rou- 

 vieri^. M. Bourguignat was led to conclude, upon evidence which he has not, so far 

 as I am aware, yet published, that these different forms belonged to different epochs, 

 which nevertheless appear to have overlapped each other. 



The oldest form, to which he assigns as its latest date 8500 B.C., is U. lartetianus ; 

 the next in point of antiquity is U. letourneuxianus, which came down from about 

 8000 to 3500 B.C.; whilst the other two {U. rouvieri and U. faidherhianus) are traced 

 to quite a recent epoch, and even, according to M. Bourguignat, may be still existing or 

 have but very recently become extinct. 



It is much to be regretted that M. Bourguignat has not as yet given more detailed 



■ It is much to be regretted that neither in the British Museum nor in the Royal College of Surgeons are 

 there any satisfactory materials for studying the osteology of the Common European Brown Bear in the wild 

 state. The bones of long-caged animals are so generally deformed, and especially in the Bear, which seems to 

 peculiarly liable to chronic rheumatic arthritis, as to be whoUy useless for any purpose of paliEontological 

 comparison. 



^ N"otice sur un Ursus nouveau. Paris, 1867. 



^ Ifotice prodromique sur ouelquea Ursidse d'Algerie. Paris, 1868. 



l2 



