FALCONER ON THE PERIM ISLAND FOSSILS. 371 



that he now admits but two species, D. giganteum and D. Kcenigii, 

 as he regards all the rest, such as D. Cuvieri, D. Bavaricum, 

 D.proavum, &c, to be merely dwarfed varieties, or females of 

 D. giganteum. M. De Blainville has arrived at nearly the same 

 conclusion in his Osteographie. It would be unsafe, therefore, to 

 found any opinion regarding the Indian fossil merely on a 

 difference of size. But, in addition to the larger dimensions, 

 the very remarkable peculiarities in the form of the jaw, indicated 

 by its great depth in front, the excessive width, massive form, and 

 circular outline in section behind, together with the absence of the 

 flattening of the inner side, which is so marked in every specimen 

 of D. giganteum, taken in conjunction with the very significant 

 difference in the thickness of the enamel, appear to furnish the 

 strongest evidence that the Indian fossil belongs to a distinct 

 species. It is to be kept in mind also, that all these differential 

 characters tend, in a remarkable manner, in the direction of 

 greater affinity with the Mastodon giganteus. In corroboration 

 of this view, it deserves to be stated that, of the numerous fossil 

 Proboscidia discovered in India we * have found that all the forms 

 are specifically distinct from those which occur in Europe. I 

 have now no hesitation in regarding both the Perim fossils to 

 belong to a distinct species of Dinotherium, larger than the 

 D. giganteum, and more closely allied to the Mastodons, which, 

 as proposed in the preceding pages, may be called D. Indicum. 



Note. — In the Athenasum, No. 923, p. 662., there is an ab- 

 stract of a paper by Mr. A. Bettington, read to the Royal Asiatic 

 Society, on the 21st of June of this year, giving an account of a 

 finely-preserved cranium of a huge Ruminant, found by that 

 gentleman in Perim Island : I have repeatedly seen the specimen, 

 which was exhibited at the anniversary meeting of the Geological 

 Society on the 17th of February last; but as unpublished material, 

 which I had no authority to quote, I have not felt at liberty to 

 refer to it in the descriptions given in this paper. Mr. Bettington 

 institutes a comparison of his fossil with the Sivatherium and 

 Giraffe, and considers it, so far as the abstract above quoted in- 

 dicates, to be distinct from both. The circumstance that this 

 cranium and the fossils here described are from the same locality, 

 creates a strong presumption that they may belong to the same 

 genus or even to the same species ; but I am unable to say in 

 how far the teeth agree, as I have not had an opportunity for 

 making the necessary comparison. Mr. Bettington, as quoted in 

 the abstract, appears to consider that, in addition to horn buttresses 

 behind the orbits, there was a pair of recurved rear horns in his 

 fossil, at the side of the occiput, placed as in the buffalo. This 

 inference, if well founded, would be against the affinities here 

 attributed to Captain Fulljames's fossil, should it prove to belong 



* In stating this, I use the plural pronoun we, intending to intimate that the 

 opinion is one in which my colleague Capt. Cautley also concurs. 



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