770 Note on a Fossil Antelope, [No. 141. 



occur in this deposit more frequently perhaps than any other, have 

 hitherto passed unnoticed. 



To supply this deficiency, however, is not my present purpose. I have 

 neither leisure, nor a sufficiently extensive museum of comparative 

 Osteology, to attempt the description, or even the classification of our 

 fossil Ruminants ; but it appeared to me to be a circumstance deserving 

 the attention of other enquirers, that there is a strong resemblance 

 between the skulls of some of our Antelopes, and those figured in Capt. 

 Harris's splendid work, " Portraits of Game and Wild Animals in 

 Southern Africa." 



The degree of resemblance will be judged from the accompanying 

 plate, in which Fig. 1 and 2, represent a front and side view of one of 

 the fossils above alluded to, about one-fourth the natural size. The 

 face of this fossil is tolerably perfect, excepting the extremities of the 

 intermaxillary bones, but the occipital portion of the head and the tips 

 of the horns are wanting. 



Fig. 3 and 4 are similar views of the skull of an Indian Antelope, 

 (A. cervicapra,) drawn on the same scale. 



Fig. 5 and 6 are outlines of the heads respectively of the Harte- 

 beest, (Acronotus Caama,) and the "Sassaybe," (Acronotus lunata,) 

 copied from Capt. Harris's plate. 



The fossil differs from the Indian Antelope, in the greater elongation 

 of its face, the straightness of its profile, the close juxta-position of 

 its horns at the base ; the absence or small development of the infra- 

 orbital sinus, and the small size of the supra- orbital foramina. In all 

 these respects it resembles one or other of the African genera, from the 

 descriptions of which, by Capt. Harris, I have extracted the following : — 



Acronotus Caama or Hartebeest. " Head remarkably heavy, narrow 

 and long. Horns seated upon the summit of a beetling ridge above 

 the frontals ; very close together, and almost touching at the base. 

 No suborbital sinus, but a constant mucous discharge of a waxy 

 nature." 



Acronotus Lunata, or Sassaybe. " Head long, narrow and shape- 

 less ; wearing a bubaline appearance, facial line straight. Eyes 

 high in the cranium, indistinct lachrymary perforation." 



As far therefore as can be judged from a description which, like the 

 above, has no particular reference to the Osteology of these animals, 



