100 Correspondence — Mr. C. Carter Blake. 



got a single bone, and am persuaded that the bed during that time 

 was not once laid open by the tides. On the other hand, the excava- 

 tions in the Thames valley are very extensive, and continually 

 worked, so that, probably, most of the species have turned up which 

 are there buried. There is certain proof of the depression of the 

 Clacton area subsequently to the period when the mammalia were 

 entombed, for the bed in which they lie is purely freshwater, and it 

 is covered with several feet of brackish water beds, with small 

 Scrohicularice ; and at the top of the section occurs a seam in which 

 I found Cyrena fluminalis, associated with dwarfed Cardium eduUy 

 and a Paludina undistinguishable from lenta. Now a similar de- 

 pression of the area seems to be shown at Grays, by the false 

 bedded sand. No. 5 of Mr. Dawkins' section/ overlying the mam- 

 maliferous gravel. 



The Clacton deposit is a true valley deposit, cut out of the London 

 clay, and an overlying gravel which Mr. Wood calls the " East 

 Essex Gravel." This gravel, as I understand him, he supposes 

 much newer than the Boulder-clay ; but at any rate it cannot be 

 older than the Middle Drift, and in either case it throws the Clacton 

 deposit into Post-glacial times. 



0. Fisher. 



BOS LONGIFEONS. 



Sir, — Owing to my absence from England, I have only just 

 enjoyed the pleasure of reading the memoir which my friend Mr. 

 Boyd Dawkins has contributed to the " Quarterly Journal of the 

 Geological Society," and which appears in their 91st No., p. 176. 

 There are some passages in this to which I may reasonably be 

 allowed to demur, and I therefore, while giving Mr. Boyd Dawkins 

 the utmost credit for the ability with which the case for the plaintiff 

 has been stated, will at once proceed to open the defence. 



The characters of Bos longifrons are clearly described by Mr. Daw- 

 kins, with such lucidity, in fact, that he is '' unable to assign any 

 characters of specific value to the animal." But I cannot allow that 

 he shows sufficient cause why two out of the three other species of 

 fossil English Bo vines should be abandoned. In a memoir of eight 

 pages, exactly twenty-one lines are devoted to the examination of 

 the claims of Bos frontosus to specific distinction ; whilst Bos trocho- 

 ceros is utterly ignored. Both these species were found associated 

 with Bos longffroYts in a refuse heap in London Wall, by my friend 

 Lieut. -Colonel A. Lane Fox, F.S.A., and the circumstances of their 

 gisement have been accurately described by him in the " Journal 

 Anthrop Soc. Lond.," Dec. 1866. Of their identification there can 

 be no doubt, and the specimens will be gladly placed in Mr. Daw- 

 kins' hands for description. 



Mr. Dawkins' argument is as follows, — " A very large number of 

 skulls from the Irish turbaries in the Museum of the Eoyal Dublin 

 Society show a marked gradation in size and form, and constitute 

 ^ Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. xxiii. p. 94. 



