]72 A Memoir on the living Asiatic Species of Rhinoceros. [No. 2, 



in the number of its dorsal vertebras and pairs of ribs, it differs from 

 both the other known species. As far as we know, there are seven 

 cervical, three lumbar, and four sacral vertebras in all the species of 

 Elephas alike. E. sttmatrantts and E. indicus agree in the 

 number of caudal vertebras, which is usually thirty-three, but in very 

 young examples sometimes only thirty. In E. africanus, on the 

 other hand, the tail never contains more than twenty-six vertebras. 

 Finally, the number of dorsal vertebras and pairs of ribs are differ- 

 ent in each of the three living species of Elephant ; being in E. afri- 

 canus twenty-one, in E. sumatrantjs twenty, and in E. indtcus 

 nineteen.* 



" It is also remarkable, that the number of true ribs is alike in all 

 the species, that is, only five ; whilst in the three species, as above 

 given, the corresponding numbers of false ribs is fifteen, fourteen, 

 and thirteen. Hence it follows that the augmentation of these 

 parts, in the different species, takes place in the direction of the 

 hindmost dorsal vertebras and pairs of ribs. 



" The laminas of the teeth afford another distinction, which, how- 

 ever, is less apparent to the eye than that taken from the number of 

 the vertebras. These laminas, or bands, in E. sitmatrakus are wider 

 (or, if one way so say, broader in the direction of the long axis of the 

 teeth,) than in E. rNDicus. In making this comparison, one must 

 remark that the distinction is less evident in younger individuals; 

 and that there are met with, in all species of Elephants, within cer- 

 tain definite limits, remarkable individual differences in respect of 

 the width of these laminas. 



"In their external form, also, the two Asiatic Elephants appear to 

 present some differences. Heer Westerman, Director of the Gard- 

 ens of the Zoological Society of Amsterdam, which has for several 

 years possessed two female Elephants of moderate size, one [receiv- 

 ed] from Calcutta and the other from Sumatra, informs me, on this 

 subject, that the Sumatran animal is more slender and more finely 

 built that the Bengalese [wherever that might have originally come 

 from!], that it has a longer and thinner snout, and that the rump at 

 the end is more broadened and covered with longer and stronger 



* The skeleton of Elephas indiccs in the Society's museum, and also that 

 in the museum of the Calcutta Medical College, are those of the true continental 

 species, according to Professor Schlegel's diagnosis. 



