Dr. A. Nehring—Fauna of the Loess in Central Europe. 53 
In August, 1874, I found in the Loess-like layers of the gypseous 
quarries of Westeregeln (situated between Magdeburg and Halber- 
stadt), beside numerous remains of wild horses, a great number of 
bones of small rodents, that excited my particular attention. A 
minute study of those bones proved that most of them belong to 
such genera and species which live at present in the Steppes of 
South-east Russia and South-west Siberia; and a minute study of 
the layers, which contained the numerous remains of Steppe-animals, 
proved that they belong to the first epoch of the Post-Glacial 
period, and are identical with or equivalent of the typical Loess. 
Already at the general meeting of the Society for Natural History 
of Saxony and Thuringia, held at Quedlinburg, Whitsuntide, 1876, 
I expressed in a public lecture! the well-founded opinion, that the 
region of Westeregeln during the period in which the Steppe-rodents 
lived there, and where their bones were imbedded in the Loess-like 
diluvium, must have exhibited the character of a landscape like the 
present Steppes in South-east Russia and South-west Siberia. 
Those species of animals, on which I principally founded the 
above-mentioned hypothesis, are the following :— 
1. Alactaga jaculus (=Dipus jaculus), represented by 150-160 
fossil bones, which belong to 21 specimens.’ 
2. Two species of Spermophilus (also represented by numerous 
specimens), of which I have identified the larger one with Spermoph. 
altaicus, Hversm., the other with Spermoph. guttatus, Temm.? My 
friend Wilh. Blasius, Professor of Zoology and Director of the Ducal 
Museum for Natural History in Brunswick, has lately, it is true, 
published a short paper,’ in which he affirms the fossil Spermophilus, 
that I have identified with Sp. aléaicus, to agree still better with 
Sp. rufescens, Keys. et Blas., than with that species. But this does 
not alter the conclusion I have drawn; for Spermoph. rufescens, 
living in the Steppes of Orenburg, is still more a characteristic 
native of the Steppes than Spermoph. altaicus. 
3. Arctomys bobac. (‘Iwo specimens, a young and an old one.) 
4, Lagomys pusillus. (Two specimens, a young and an old one.) 
5. Several species of the genus Arvicola, as Arvicola gregalis, A. 
ratticeps, A. amphibius, A. arvalis, A. alliarius, represented by 
numerous specimens. 
6. Wild horses, represented by many remains of old and young 
Specimens. 
pp- 218-228 ; 1879, pp. 663-671, u. 712-726; ‘‘ Globus,” 1878, Bd. 34, No. 6 u. 
7, 1880, Bd. 37, No. 1 u. No. 20. “ Ausland,’ 1876, p. 937 ss. 1877, p. 594 ss. 
1878, p. 114 ss. 1880, No, 26. Archiv f. Anthropologie, 1877, pp. 859-398, 1878, 
pp. 1-24.  Zeitschr. f. Ethnologie, 1879, p. 137 ss. mit Taf. and numerous 
reports in the Sitzungsberichten der Berliner Ges. f. Urgeschichte since 1876.— 
Neues Jahrb. f. Mineralogie, 1880, p. 1138 ss. mit. 2 Tafeln. Ibidem 
numerous brief. Mittheilungen, —Zeitschr. d. deutschen geol. Gesellsch. 1880, pp. 
468-509. Jahresbericht d. Vereins f. Naturw. in Braunschweig, 1879-1880, pp- 
11 ss., 1880-81, pp. 28 ss. ‘‘ Natur,” 1879, No. 45. 
1 Cf. Zeitschr. f. d. ges. Naturwiss. 1876, Bd. 47, s. 537. 
2 Zeitschr. f. d. ges. ” Naturwiss. 1876, Bd. 47, p. 18 ss. Bd. 48, p. 191 ss. Arch. 
f. Anthropol. 1877, p. 380 ss. 
3 Zoolog. Anzeiger, 1882, No. 125, p. 610 ss. 
