78 



THE EDINBURGH JOURNAL OF NATURAL HISTORY, 



domestic animals. The first brood should be carefully preserved ; for if thay can be 

 induced to reproduce, their progeny will in all probabihty succeed, and be rendered 

 completely domesticated, thus provinsf a valuable accession to the luxuries of the table. 

 During our residence at Prinlaws House, near Leslie, in Fife, a pair of Ringdoves 

 built and incubated on a spruce fir-tre?, m a plantation which bounded oar garden, 

 and not more than fifteen yards from the house. Th^ir nest was not more than 

 twenty-five feet from the ground, and close to a {^^arden walk through which the fa- 

 mily were constantly passing. Yet this seemed to give the connubial pair no uneasi- 

 ness, as the female would sit on her nest, with her mate by her side, without at- 

 tempting to quit the spot on the approach even of several individuals. The first 

 young, which they brought up in the fuUowing spring, built a nest in a spruce fir 

 within the garden, and reared their young. Both these nests were occupied evi-ry 

 season afterwards during the four years which we remained there. These Birds 

 very fri*quently alighted and fed in the garden, and even ate occasionally along 

 with the domestic poultry ; from which we are of opinion thaf, if unmolested, the 

 Cushat is not so shy a Bird as is generally imagined, and that it is only from perse- 

 cution that it retires to the deep recesses of woods for shelter from its numerous 

 enemies. 



Singular Tenacity of Life in an Aquatic Molluscous Animal. — M. 

 Rang, Member of the Royal Academy of Sciences, Paris, received four young speci- 

 mens of Anodonta rubens, of Lamarck, from Senegal, and although they had been 

 enveloped in cotton for two months, they were still alive; he had learnt that these 

 animals live eight months of the year out of water, upon the ground being suddenly 

 abandoned by the river, and that they remain during sis of these months exposed to 

 the ardent heat of an almost vertical sun. 



Marine and River Mollusca in the Gulf of Livonia. — So inconsiderable 

 is the saltness of the sea-water in the Gulf of Livonia, that fresh and salt water con- 

 chiferous molluscous animals live together promiscuously on the same coasts. i\L 

 Freminville informed the Philoraatic Society of Paris, that he collected from the 

 same localities species of the fresh water genera, Anodonta, JJiiio, and C^c/as, which 

 were intermixed with species of the Marine genera, TtiJiina, Cardium, and Venus, 



Step of the Camel. — What always struck me, as something extremely romantic 

 and mysterious, was the noiseless step of the Camel, and the spongy nature of his 

 foot. Whatever be the nature of the ground — sand or rock, turf or paved stones — you 

 hear no foot-fall; you see an immense annimal approaching you, stilJi/ as a cloud 

 floating on air, d.nd unless he w'ear a bell, your sense of hearing, acute as it may be, 

 will give you no intimation of his presence. — Constantinople in IS^S, h^f Charles 

 Macfarlane 



SIVATHERIUM GIGANTEUM. 



This very large animal forms an important accession to extinct Zoology. In size 

 it greatly surpasses the Rhinoceros, and hence is larger than any known Ruminant 

 in the Class Mammalia to which it belongs; at the same time the forms of struc- 

 ture which the Sivatherium exhibits, render it one of the most remarkable of fossd 

 animals hitherto detected in the more recent strata of the globe. 



Of the numerous fossil mammiferous genera previously discovered and established, all 

 were confined to the Edentata and Pachydermata. The fossil species belonging to 

 other orders have all their living analogues upon the earth ; and among the Rumin- 

 antia, in particular, no remarkable deviation from the existing types has hitherto been 

 discovered. However, the isolated position of the Girafi^e and the Camels made it 

 probable that certain genera had become extinct, which formed the connecting links 

 between these and the other genera of the order, as well as between the Ruminantia 

 and the Pachydermata. In the Sivatherium we have a Ruminant of this descrip- 

 tion, connecting that order with the Pachydermata, and at the same time so mai'ked 

 by individual peculiarities as to be without a living analogue in its own order. 



i/0/W Hllk," SC 



■^^iiiiiiii04 



The large cranium of the Sivatherium, of which the above are representations in 

 profile and in front, is a remarkably perfect fossil. When discovered, it was fortu- 

 nately so completely enveloped in amass of stone, that although it had hmg been ex- 

 posed to be acted upon as a boulder in a water-course, all the more important parts 

 of structure had been preserved. The block might have been passed unnoticed, had 

 not' a projecting edge of the teeth, by juttin? out in rehef, given a promise of some- 

 thing additional concealed beneath. After much labour, the hard crystalline cover- 

 ing of stone was so successfully removed, that the huge head now stands out, with a 

 couple of horns between the orbits, broken only near the tips, and the nasal bones 

 projected in a free arch high above the chaffron. All the molars on both sides of 

 the jaw are present, and singularly perfect. The only mutilation of the fossil is at 



the vertex of the cranium, where the plane of the occipital meets that of the brow, 

 and at the muzzle, wliich is truncated a little way in front of the first molar tootb. 

 The only parts which are still concealed are a portion of the occipital, the zygoma- 

 tic fossiE on both sides, and the base of the cranium over the sphenoid bone. 



The form of the head is so singular and grotesque, that the first glance strikes us 

 with surprise. The prominent features are, \st. The great s:ze, approaching u» 

 that of the Elephant ; 2d, The immense development and width of the cranium be- 

 hind the orbits ; 3r7, The two divergent osseous cones for horns, starting out from 

 the brow, between ihd orbits ; 4M, The form and direction of the nasal bones, rising 

 with great prominence out of the chaffron, and overhanging the external nostrils ia 

 a pointed arc'h ; ttk. The great masiiveness, width, and shortness of the face for- 

 ward from the orbits ; Qth, The great angle at which the grinding plane of tha 

 molars deviates upwards from the base of the skull. 



Viewed in lateral profile, the for n and direction of the horns, and the rise and 

 sweep in the bon?s of the nos^, give a character to the head widely differing from 

 that of any other animal. Tne no32 looks sometliing like that of the Rhinoceros; 

 but the rescmbhmce is deceptive, and only owing to the muzzle being truncated. 

 Seen from the front, the hr'ad is somewhat weJge-shapsd, the greatest width being 

 at the vertex, thence gradually compressed towards the muzzlf? ; with contraction 

 only at rwo points, b.'hind the orbits and under the molars. The zygomatic archea 

 are almost concaled, and nowise promment ; the brow is broad and flat, and swell- 

 ing latterly into two convexities ; the orbits are wide apart, and have the appearance 

 of being thrown far forward, from the great production of the frontal upwards. 

 There are no crests or ridges ; the surface of the cranium is smooth ; the lines are in 

 curves, with no i.ngularity. From tht? vertjx to the root of the nose, the plane of 

 the brow is in a straight line, with a slight rise between the horns. 



There are six molars on each sidi of the upper jaw. Ths third of the series, or 

 last milk molar, has giv.^n place to the corresponding prominent tooth, the direction 

 of which, and of the last molar, is well advanced, and indicates the animal to hav« 

 been more than adult. 



The teeth are in every respsct those of a Ruminant, with some slight individual 

 pecuharities. The three posierior double molars are composed of two portions or 

 semi-cylinders, each of which incloses, when partially worn dov9n, a double crescent 

 of enamel, the convexity of which is turned inwards. The last molar, which is nor- 

 mal in Ruminants, has no additional complication, like that in the corresponding 

 tooth in the lower jaw. The plane of grinding slopes from the outer margin in- 

 wards. The general form is exactly that of an Ox or Camel, on a large scale. 

 The ridges of enamel are unequally in relief, and the hollows between them equally 

 scooped. Each semi-cylinder has its outer surface in horizontal sections, formed of 

 three salient knuckles, with two intermediate sinuses, and its inner surface of a sim- 

 ple arch or curve. Bat there are certain peculiarities by which the teeth differ from 

 those of other Ruminants. 



Corresponding to the shortness oF jaw, the width of the teeth is much greater in 

 proportion to the length than is usual in this order, the width of the third and fourth 

 molars being to the length as 2.24 and 2.2 to 1.55 and 1.G8 inches respectively, 

 and the average width of the whole series being to the length as 2. 13 to 1.76 inches. 

 Their form is less prismatic, the base of the shaft swelling out into a bulge or collar, 

 from «hieh the innnr surface slopes outward as it rises, so that the coronal becomes 

 somewhat contracted. In the third molar, the width at the coronal is 1.93, at the 

 bulge of the shaft 2,24. The crescentic plates of enamel have a chai-acter which 

 distinguishes them from all other known Ruminants ; the inner crescent, instead of 

 sweeping in a nearly simple curve, runs zig-zag-wise, in large sinuous flexures, some- 

 what resembling the form of the Elosmatherium. The space occupied by the lin& 

 of the molars is 9.8 inches. 



From the anterior margin of the foramina to the alveolus or first 



molar tooth, - - - _ . _ _ 18.85 incbca 



From diito to the truncated extremity of the muzzle, - 20.6 



From the tip of the nasals to the upper fractured margin of the 



cranium, _____ J 8.0 



From ditto to ditto along the curve, - - 19.0 



Width of cranium at 1 he vertex, _ _ _ 22.0 



Ditto between the orbits, upper borders, - - 12.2 



Ditto, ditto, lower borders, - - _ 16.3 



Ditto between the outer surfaces of the horns at their base, 12.5 



Among a quantity of bones collected in the neighbourhood of the spot in which 

 the skull was found, there is a fragment of the lower jaw of a very large Ruminant, 

 which is supposed to have balon^ed to th^ Slvatheriu.n ; and it is even not impro- 

 bable that it came from the same individual with the head now described. It con- 

 sists of the hind portion of the right jaw, broken off at the anterior margin of the last 

 molar. The outline of the jaw, in vertical sections, is a compressed ellipse, and the 

 outer surface more convex than the inner. The form and relative proportions of 

 the jaw agree very closely with tiiose of the corresponding parts of the Buffalo. 

 The dimensions, compared with those of the Buffalo and Camel, are thus: 



Sivatherium. Buffalo. Camel. 



Depth of the jaw from the alveolus- last molar, 4.95 2 Qb 2.70 inches. 



Greatest thickness of ditto, - - 2.3 1.05 1.4 



Width of middle of last molar, - - 1.35 0.64 0.76 



Length of posterior, | of ditto, - 2.15 0.95 1.15 



Ko known Ruminant fossil has a jaw of such large size, — the average dimen 

 sions above given being more than double those of a Buffalo, which measured in 

 length of head 19.2 inches, and exceeding those of the corresponding parts of 

 the Rhinoceros. 



This gigantic fossil cranium, above described, was discovered near the Markenda 

 river, in one of the small valleys which stretch between the Kyarda-dtln and the val- 

 ley of Pinjor, in the SivMik or sub- Himalayan belt of hills, associated with bones of 

 the fossil Elephant, Mastodon, Rhinoceros, Hippopotamus, &c. 



