574 Fossil Molar Tooth of the Mastodon Australis. 



The close approximation of the Australian Mastodon to the Mast, 

 angustidens will be appreciated by a comparison of fig. 1 with a simi- 

 lar direct side-view of an equally incompletely- formed molar given 

 by Cuvier, loc. cit. pi. 1. fig. 1 ; but this tooth, being from a more 

 posterior part of the jaw, has an additional pair of pyramidal emi- 

 nences ; and if the proportions of the figure of half an inch be ac- 

 curate, the European tooth is rather smaller than the Australian fos- 



Fig. 2. 



Mastodon australis, half nat. size, 

 sil, notwithstanding its additional tubercles and more backward 

 position in the jaw. 



The Australian fossil tooth here described was brought by a 

 native to Count Strzlecki, whilst that enterprising and accomplished 

 traveller was exploring the ossiferous caves in Wellington Valley. 

 The native stated that the fossil was taken out of a cave further 

 in the interior than those of Wellington Valley, and which Count 

 Strzlecki was deterred from exploring by the hostility of the tribe 

 then in possession of the district. With this circumstantial account, 

 communicated to me by Count Strzlecki when he obligingly placed 

 the fossil in my hands, and with the previous indication of a large 

 Mastodontoid quadruped in the femur transmitted by Sir T. Mitchell 

 from Darling Downs, there seems no ground for scepticism as to the 

 veritable Australian origin of the molar tooth in question, notwith- 

 standing its close similarity with the Mastodon angustidens of the 

 European tertiary strata. It is partially mineralized and coated by the 

 reddish ferruginous earth characteristic of the Australian fossils dis- 

 covered in the Wellington ossiferous caves by Sir T. Mitchell. 



