198 



FAUNA ANTIQUA SIVALENSIS. 



arteries, wliich enter the vertebral canal along with the 

 spinal cord, then penetrate the superior vertebral lamiiue, 

 and emerge on the canal again close mider the anterior 

 oblique processes. This structure appears in the cervical 

 vertebrse of the Sewalik fossil camel. In the vertebra now 

 under consideration, on the contrary, the foramina (a, a') 

 maintain their ordinary position, that is, they perforate the 

 transverse processes, and appear on the surface of the body 

 of the vertebra. 



Since the bone therefore does not belong to a camel, is it 

 the bone of a giraffe ? There is preserved in the Museum of 

 the Zoological Society the skeleton of a young Nubian gu'affe 

 which died at the Society's gardens. When its third cervical 

 vertebra is placed in apposition with the fossil, the two are 

 found to agree in every general character, though they dis- 

 agree in some of their proportions, and in certain minor pecu- 

 liarities. In this young and immature giraffe the length of 

 the third cervical vertebra is 7i inches ; what, then, is the 

 length of this bone in the adult Nubian giraffe ? The authors, 

 from their not having had under their examination this ver- 

 tebra from an adult animal, have been unable to ascertain 

 this point directly ; but they are able to infer it, from the 

 length of a detached bone preserved in the Museum of the 

 Royal College of Surgeons of London, which is the second 

 cervical vertebra of a giraffe, nearly, but not quite, full grown.' 

 The length of this bone is 11| inches. Now in the skeleton 

 of the young giraffe belonging to the Zoological Society the 

 2nd and 3rd cervical vertebrae are exactly of the same length. 

 The authors infer, therefore, that in an animal nearly full- 

 grown, such as was that to which the detached bone at the 

 College of Surgeons belonged, the length of the 3rd cervical 

 vertebra is 11^ inches ; and consequently, that the length of 

 the same bone in an animal which has reached fuU maturity 

 is about 12 inches. ^ 



That the fossil vertebra belonged to an adult wliich had 

 long attained its fall size is shown by the complete synostosis 

 of the upper and lower artictdating surfaces, by the strong- 

 relief of the ridges and the depth of the muscular depres- 

 sions. But the length of this bone is only a little more than 

 eight mches. As the other dimensions of the fossil and 

 recent vertebrse that the authors placed in apposition are 

 nearly in proportion to their respective lengths, it foUows 



* This appears from the detached 

 state of the upper aud lower articulating 

 heads of the bone. 



^ The height of the skeleton of the 



young giraffe in the museum of the 

 Zoological Society is 10^ feet ; that of a 

 full-grown Nubian giraffe is 16 feet. 



