﻿L2 



BRITISH FOSSIL ELEPHANTS. 





U. upper. 

 L. lower. 



Plates ; talons x. 



Maximum length 

 and breadth of 

 crown. 



Eemarks. 





r 



u 



x 3 x 



07 x 5 



Mus. Royal Coll. Surg. England. 







u 



L 



x4x 

 x3x 



0-8 X 0-55 

 07 X 0-5 



Busk, ' Trans. Z. S. L.,' vol. vi, table, 

 p. 307. 



Mus. Royal Coll. Surg. England. 







L 



x Ax 



075 x 45 



Busk, ' Trans. Z. S. L.,' vol. vi, table, 

 p. 307. 



Affinities. — The first or ante-penultimate milk molar in the Mammoth is not, that I 

 am aware of, represented in any collection, public or private, in Great Britain ; and 

 Dr. Falconer does not appear to have met with it, and surmises only as to its probable 

 ridge formula/ so that his inferences are based on the strict concord which exists in 

 the number of lamina of its successional teeth and of the Asiatic Elephant. It is of 

 the utmost importance, however, with reference to E. antiquus and allied forms that 

 comparisons should be drawn between the ante-penultimate milk molars in them and the 

 Mammoth. It may be stated, as regards the teeth here referred to E. atttiquus, that 

 their discoveries in the fluviatile deposits at Grays Thurrock and in the Victoria Cave, 

 irrespective of dental characters, are additional evidence of their connection with E. antiquus, 

 seeing that the former has produced more molars of this Elephant, than perhaps any single 

 locality in England, and the latter has furnished remains of E. antiquus only. Judging 

 from what is known of the dentition of the Mammoth, it seems to me highly probable that 

 its ante-penultimate milk molar will show a higher ridge formula and much more 

 attenuated ridges than in E. antiquus. 



This molar in E. meridionalis, according to Falconer, is " a broad oval, narrowest in 

 front and broadest in the middle," with "very wide disks " and "thick enamel plates " 

 in the upper jaw, whilst the lower molar is " much smaller and more compressed in 

 front," and " cusp-shaped, like the corresponding tooth of the Sewalik " E. (Lowodon) 

 planifrons? 



The same tooth in the Maltese fossil Elephants is quite like that of the E. antiquus, 

 but is of smaller size. 4 



The ante-penultimate in the African is rather more robust ordinarily, but does not, 



1 I prefer Asiatic to Indian as a general designation fortbe animal of Asia, including the Hindee, Suma- 

 tran, Burmese, and Cylonese Elephants, on the score that they are only varieties of one Continental species. 



2 'Pal. Mem.,' vol. ii, pp. 159 and 161. 



3 'Pal. Mem.,' vol. i, p. 21 (Note), vol. ii, pp. 110 and 114, and 'Fauna Antiqua Sivalensis,' 

 pi. xii, figs. 1, 1 a, 1 b. The close affinities between the E. meridionalis and E. planifrons on the one 

 hand, and the E. antiquus and E. Namadicus on the other, were repeatedly pointed out by Falconer. 



* ' Trans. Zool. Soc. Lon.,' vol. ix, p. 12, pi. i, figs. 3, 4, and 5. 



