1867.] BOYD DAWZINS — BOS LONaiFRONS. 181 



the museum mentioned in wMch they are to be seen*. In the 

 Hunterian Catalogue, Professor Owen has rightly ascribed the 

 small bones from this locaKty to the Bison, the larger to the 

 Urus; and they constitute a large and valuable series, affording 

 a means of separating the former from the latter species. In 

 no other museum can I find any other Bovine remains from this 

 deposit. In the ' Life and Papers of H. E. Strickland' f, published 

 by Sir W. Jardine in 1858, there is no mention of the Bos longifrons 

 among the animals he found at Bricklehampton. The small sizes of 

 the metacarpals and metatarsals of Bison, which closely resemble those 

 of the British Shorthorn, may perhaps have caused Professor Owen, 

 between the publication of the Hunterian Catalogue and that of the 

 ' British Fossil Mammals,' to ascribe some of these to the latter animal. 

 The horn-cores, which, in a disputed point, such as this, are alone to be 

 relied upon, belong to the Bison ; and therefore it is highly probable 

 that the equivocal remains which, in the absence of horn-cores, might 

 perhaps have been considered to be those of Bos longifrons, belong- 

 also to the fonner. Precisely the same argument applies to the Bos 

 longifrons of Kirkdale X, which is proved by the horn-cores to be the 

 small variety of Bison — the Bison minor of Professor Owen. A fifth 

 locality is given of its occurrence with the extinct Mammals, the 

 gravel-pits of Kensington. In the absence, however, of direct proof 

 that the remains of Bos longifrons were derived from the same undis- 

 turbed gravel as the Mammoth, the fact that the disturbed soil round 

 London is fuU. of the bones of Bos longifrons, which was the principal 

 food of the inhabitants of the metropolis of Roman Britain, would 

 strongly suggest that those iu question were found in the superficial 

 soil, and not in the gravel below. A parallel instance at Peckham, 

 on a very careful examination, I found to be explained in this man- 

 ner. 



In the list of Mammals found at Pisherton §, Bos longifrons is 

 quoted as having been found in association with the Lemming, 

 Spermoi3hilus, Marmot, Tichorhine Rhinoceros, and other charac- 

 teristic Postglacial species ; but the remains ascribed to this animal 

 and preserved in the Salisbury Museum, consisting of teeth and 

 bones and not characteristic horn- cores, in truth belong to the smaller 

 variety of Bison, B. minor of Professor Owen, which is very abun- 

 dant in that locality. All the other cases quoted of its association 

 with Pleistocene Mammals may be disposed of in the same way. 

 The result of a careful examination of the mammalian remaius in 

 the collections of Great Britatu and Ireland, is the discovery that 

 there is no authentic evidence of the smaU Shorthorn having lived 

 in Pleistocene times. It has never been found in Pleistocene de- 

 posits in Prance, Germany, or elsewhere in Europe. For these rea- 



* Catalogue of Fossil Mammals, Nos. 1351-1393. 



t 0^. cit. p. 96. Hippopotamus major, Canis, and the Urus were also found 

 in the gravel and clay of the section. 



+ Op. cit. p. 513. 



§ Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. xs. p. 192, and Catalogue of Blackmore Mu- 

 seum, Salisbmy, 8vo. 



