THE 



GEOLOGICAL MAGAZINE. 



NEW SERIES. DECADE III. VOL. I. 



No. X.— OCTOBER, 1884. 



os,iC3-ii<rjLXj Jk.I^TIOIJES. 



I. — Notes on Some New Carnivores from the British Eocene 



Formations. 



By William Davies, F.G.S. ; of the British Museum (Natural History). 



(PLATE XV.) 



THE remains of many genera and species of the Order Carnivora 

 have been discovered in the Lower and Middle Tertiaries of the 

 European Continent, and have been described and figured iu 

 numerous valuable palseontological works and memoirs by Conti- 

 nental authors. That these remains are exceedingly rare in the 

 older Tertiaries of England is proved by the fact, that only one 

 Carnivore, the Hi/cenodon,^ has been placed on record as occurring 

 in them. 



There are, however, some imperfect remains of other genera, 

 hitherto unnoticed, preserved in the National Collection (Natural 

 History), Cromwell Eoad, South Kensington. These remains, 

 although fragmentary, are interesting, as being new, and therefore 

 worthy of record as additions to our scanty list of Eocene Carnivores. 

 The most important is part of the head of a small animal about the 

 size of a Fox (No. 30203), from the Eocene Freshwater Beds at 

 Hordwell — whence the Hi/ienodon remains were also obtained — 

 still partly embedded in the characteristic friable sandy matrix 

 which has yielded remains of many vertebrates. It is obliquely 

 crushed, and little besides the base of the skull, a maxilla, the man- 

 dibular rami and the teeth, upper and lower, are preserved. The 

 exact form of the bones of the head is unknown ; but the profile 

 is fairly preserved in the matrix, those portions which are 

 present being respectively in their natural positions, in regard to 

 each other, we have almost accurate evidence of size, the length 

 from the exoccipital condyles to the anterior margin of the canine 

 being 4*7 inches. 



The exoccipital condyles are entire, and portions of the basi- and 

 pre-sphenoids are preserved, also the tympanic bullae, but these are 

 too crushed and imperfect to serve as aids to generic identification ; 

 a portion of the left maxilla and the rami of the lower jaw are 

 preserved, fortunately having nearly the whole of the side teeth 

 in situ. There are also portions of the atlas, axis and the third 

 cervical vertebra, but too imperfect for comparison or measurement. 



The mouth being closed when the skull was embedded, with the 



1 Owen, " Palseontology," 2nd edit. 1861, p. 372. 



DECADE III. — VOL. I. — NO. X. 28 



