134 p. N. BOSE ON FOSSIL CARNIVORA 



Lutva Living 



pOlcBindica. Indian Otter. 



Upper jaw— inch. inch. 



Length occupied by the incisors on each side 0-077 0*061 



„ „ molars and canines 0-385 0-343 



Antero-posterior length of canine 0-084 0-061 



„ „ sectorial (outer 



border) 0-127 0-111 



Maximum transverse diameter of tubercular 0-127 0-111 

 Antero-posterior length of tubercular (outer 



border) 0*09 0-084 



Lower jaw — 



Length occupied by the molar series .... 0*39 0*343 



Antero-posterior length of carnassial .... 0*146 0*14 



[The length taken as modulus in the above measurements is 

 3-575 inches in the fossil, and 4-075 inches in the living Indian 

 Otter selected for comparison. The absolute measurements can be 

 deduced from this.] 



Cakis cxtevipalattts, nob. 



The specimen consists of a cranium deficient only in the zygo- 

 matic arches and in the anterior portion of the palate. The lower 

 jaw of the left side shows the three hinder premolars and the first 

 two molars in situ, and the alveoli of the first premolar and the 

 last molar. The lower jaw of the right side is broken off posteriorly, 

 but is more complete in front than its fellow of the left side and 

 shows the base of the canine. The cranium has suffered from a 

 crush, and has, in consequence, been somewhat flattened anteriorly ; 

 but no distortion, at least to any considerable extent, has taken 

 place. The cranium was briefly described and figured by Messrs. 

 Baker and Durand in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of 

 Bengal for 1836*. By comparing it with one of a living Indian 

 Pox (with which the fossil is most closely allied), those able palae- 

 ontologists found that the fossil, while agreeing generally with the 

 latter, differed from it in the greater breadth of the brain-case, the 

 height and thickness of the lambdoidal crest at the summit of the 

 supraoccipital, the greater concavity and size of the postorbital pro- 

 cesses of the frontal, and the closer approximation of the false 

 molars in the upper jaw; but they did not notice the following 

 important peculiarities of the fossil, nor did they give it any specific 

 name : — 



(1) In all Canidse, and more or less in all other Carnivora, the 

 basifacial axis is parallel to the basicranial axis ; but in the fossil 

 now under examination the palate makes an angle, though a very 

 open one, with the base of the cranium, somewhat as in the Rabbit. 

 The specific name is derived from this the most characteristic 

 feature of the fossil. 



^ This description has been quoted in the Pal. Mem. vol. i. p. 341, 



