150 Geological Society : — Mr. W. B. Dawkins on 



flattened. A third, flattened tyne springs on the anterior side of the 

 beam ; and immediately above it the broad crown terminates in two 

 or more points. Wo tyne is thrown off on the posterior side of the 

 antler, and the sweep is uninterrupted from the antler-base to the 

 first point of the crown. The antlers differ in curvature and other- 

 wise from those of Cervus megaceros; but there is a general resem- 

 blance between the two animals, and the verticomis must have 

 rivalled the Irish Elk in size. A second species of Deer, the 

 Cervus carnutorum, which had been furnished by the strata of St.- 

 Prest near Chartres, must be added to the fauna of the Forest-bed. 

 The Cervidae of the Forest-bed present a remarkable mixture of 

 forms, such as the Cervus jpolignacus, C. Sedgwickii, C. megaceros, 

 O. carnutorum, C. ela/plius, and C. capreolus, seeming to indicate 

 that in classification the Forest-bed belongs rather to an early stage 

 of the Pleistocene than to the Pliocene age. This inference is 

 strongly corroborated by the presence of the Mammoth, which is so 

 characteristic of the Pleistocene age. 



3. " The Classification of the Pleistocene Strata of Britain and 

 the Continent by means of the Mammalia." By W. Boyd Dawkins, 

 Esq., M.A., F.R.S., F.G.S. 



The Pleistocene deposits may be divided into three groups : — 1st, 

 that in which the Pleistocene immigrants lived, with some of the 

 southern and Pliocene animals in Britain, France, and Germany, and 

 in which no arctic mammalia had arrived ; 2nd, that in which the 

 characteristic Pliocene Cervidse had disappeared, and the Elephas 

 meridionalis and Bhinoceros etruscus had been driven south ; 3rd, 

 that in which the true arctic mammalia were the chief inhabitants. 



This third or late Pleistocene division must be far older than any 

 Prehistoric deposits, as the latter often rest on the former, and are 

 composed of different materials ; but the difference offered by the 

 fauna is the most striking. In the Pleistocene river-deposits twenty- 

 eight species have been found, the remains of man being associated 

 with the Lion, Hippopotamus, Mammoth, Wolf, and Reindeer. On 

 examining the fauna from the ossiferous caves, we find the same 

 group of animals, with the exception of the Musk-sheep ; and it is 

 therefore evident that the cave-fauna is identical with that of the 

 liver strata, and mast be referred to the same period. Some few 

 animals, however, which would naturally haunt caves, are peculiar 

 to them, as the Cave-bear, Wild Cat, Leopard, &c. 



The magnitude of the break in time between the Prehistoric and 

 late Pleistocene period may be gathered also from the disappearance 

 in the interval of no less than nireteen species. 



The middle division of the Pleistocene nammalia, or that from 

 which the Pliocene Cervidse had disappeared and been replaced by 

 invading temperate forms, is represented in Great Britain by the 

 deposits of the Lower Brick-earths of the Thau.es valley, and the 

 older deposits in Kent's Hole and Oreston. The discovery, by the 

 Rev. 0. Fisher, of a flint-flake in the undisturbed Lower Brick- earth 

 at Crayford proves that man must have been living at this time. 



