62 MB. G. BUSK OK THE EXISTING SPECIES OE HT^NA. 



In the Museum of the Eoyal College of Surgeons the materials 

 aiforded are (1.) a very fine cranium with the teeth in beautiful 

 condition, named H. crocuta, and numbered 4447 ; (2.) a skull 

 belonging to the entire skeleton of a "Spotted Hyena," which 

 when alive was in the possession of the late Dr. Buckland ; and 

 (3.) several crania of S. striata. 



"With respect to the Striped Hyena of course no question could 

 arise ; and with respect to the others, as there appeared to be no 

 reason to doubt the correctness of the appellations bestowed upon 

 them, it was naturally assumed that the two crania named S. 

 hrunnea in the British Museum afforded types of that species. 

 And indeed, as will afterwards appear, upon comparison of these 

 two crania with those of undoubted specimens of Sycena crocuta 

 in the same collection, sufficient differences are at first sight ap- 

 parent between them to justify any one, in the absence of direct 

 testimony to the contrary, in supposing that they belonged to dis- 

 tinct species. An additional piece of evidence was also believed to 

 be forthcoming, which would have been conclusive as to the point 

 to which species these crania belonged, inasmuch as in the Cata- 

 logue an asterisk prefixed to one of them was taken to imply that 

 the stuffed skin of the animal was also in the national collection. 

 Upon comparison again of these two specimens with that num- 

 bered 4447 in the Eoyal College of Surgeons, which was widely 

 different from the cranium belonging to Dr. Buckland's specimen 

 of S. crocuta, the characters of the three, allowing for differences 

 of age, &c., were so similar that Dr. Palconer was persuaded that 

 they all three belonged to one and the same species, and that that 

 species was closely allied to if not identical with the fossil Hyena 

 from Gribraltar, and, in all probability, also with H. spelcea. He 

 therefore was led to the conclusion that the " Strand Wolf" of 

 South Africa had at one time extended as far North as Gribraltar 

 at least, if indeed it had not at a still remoter period abounded in 

 far more distant northern latitudes. Biassed no doubt by the 

 weight of Dr. Falconer's opinion, Mr. Boyd Dawkins, in his 

 valuable paper on the Dentition of Sycena spelcea*, adopted the 

 same view ; and, as I have said, it appeared to me also an inevi- 

 table conclusion from the premises. No mistake, however, could 

 be greater, or, in a palaeontological sense, attended with more im- 

 portant consequences. 



Unable to reconcile Mr. Boyd Dawkins's account of the sup- 

 posed H. hrunnea, taken from the specimens 822 (5) in the Bri- 

 * Nat. Hist. Eeview. No. XVII. p. 80, Jan. 1865. 



