jff. Woodward — Visit to the Brussels Museum. 195 



by a mass of fragments and debris. With the Mammoth were found 

 remains of Hyaena, Horse, Eeindeer, Bhinoceros megarhiniis, and 

 Bison, with horn-cores measuring four feet along the curve of the cores. 

 To M. de Koninck, Professor of Palaeontology, etc., in the Univer- 

 sity of Liege (one of the highest living authorities upon the fossils 

 of the Carboniferous formation), was deputed the task of superin- 

 tending the gathering together of these interesting remains for the 

 Museum of the State. That learned savant, having examined the 

 remains of the Mammoth, arrived at the conclusion that it was 

 possible to reconstruct an entire skeleton therefrom. This opinion, 

 however, was not shared by Viscount du Bus, then Director of the 

 Museum; the bones were therefore allowed tO' remain ignominiously 

 hidden away in the basement of the Museum. 



Upon the appointment of M. E. Dupont as Director, that gentle- 

 man, with the ardour for which he is so well characterized, deter- 

 mined to signalize his entrance into office by carrying into effect the 

 long-forsaken desigti of restoring the skeleton, of the Mammoth from 

 Lierre. At first the task seemed all but hopeless. The head was 

 broken up into such an immense quantity of small fragments, the 

 reconstruction of which seemed all but impossible ; but the per- 

 severance of M. Dupont — assisted by a modeller of remarkable 

 sagacity, M. Louis Depauw — overcame all difficulties, and in 

 October, 1869, the restored Mammoth adorned the centre of one of 

 the Galleries of the Museum, surrounded by numerous remains of 

 the same species, a remounted but very incomplete skeleton of 

 Elephas antiquus, and other bones from the Post-Tertiary deposits 

 which the fortifications around Antwerp have furnished in abundance. 

 The two views of the Belgian Mammoth in the accompanying 

 Plate IV. are reproductions on stone by Mr. G. R, de Wilde, of 

 photographs (issued by permission of the Director) prepared by 

 M. de Blochouscj of Brussels, of whom copies may be obtained.. 

 Photographs on a larger scale have also been prepared for distribu- 

 tion to the principal Museums throughout Europe., 



I was also informed by M. de Borre that the Brussels Museum. 

 was prepared to offer casts of the entire skeleton of the Mammoth 

 to any Museum having sufficiently valuable duplicates to give in 

 exchange. 



The figures are on a scale of one-fiftieth of the natural size. ft. in. 

 The actual height of the skeleton to the shoulders is ... 11 6 



Length of the tusks 8 6 



Length of the femur .... ... 4 



That this example of the Mammoth was a young individual is 

 proved by the epiphyses of the extremities of the humeri, and 

 femora, which remain imperfectly ossified. The broad iliac bones of 

 the pelvis are exceedingly large and prominent. The tusks are 

 more slender and less recurved than are those of our British Mam- 

 moth from Tlford. (See Geological Magazine, Vol. V. 1868, 

 p. 540, PI. XXII. and XXIII.) In the Ilford example the tusk in 

 situ in the socket shows eight feet eight inches (measured along the 

 outer curve) ; whilst that which is detached shows it to be (with the 



