§ 26. REMARKABLE COLLOCATION OF FOSSIL ANIMALS. 163 



comprise perfect specimens of skulls, and jaws, of gigantic 

 size. The tusks of one example are 9 feet 6 inches lono- 

 and 27 inches in circumference at the base.* 



26. Remarkable Collocation of Fossil Animals. 



But this collection is invested with the highest interest 

 not solely on account of the number and variety of the 

 specimens, but, also, for the extraordinary assemblage of 

 animals which it presents. In the Sub-Himalayahs we have 

 entombed in the same rocky sepulchre, bones of the most 

 ancient extinct races of mammalia, with species and o-enera 

 which still inhabit India ! Palaeotheria, Anoplotheria, 

 Dinotheria, Mastodons, Elephants, Giraffes, Hippopotami, 

 Ehinoceroses, Horses, Camels, Antelopes, and even Mon- 

 keys ; Struthious Birds, and Crocodilian and Chelonian rep- 

 tiles. To this concise enumeration must be added several 

 genera previously unknown ; large rodents, and insec- 

 tivora, &c. 



Among these marvellous relics of the past, are the skull 

 and bones of an animal named Sivatherium (from the Indian 

 deity Siva), that requires a passing notice. This creature 

 forms, as it were, a link between the ruminants and the large 

 pachyderms. It was larger than a rhinoceros, had four 

 horns, and was furnished with a proboscis; thus combining 

 the horns of a ruminant with the characters of a pachy- 

 derm. When living, it must have resembled an im- 

 mense antelope, or gnu, with a short and thick head, and 

 an elevated cranium crested with two pairs of horns ; the 

 front pair were small, and the hinder large, and set quite 

 behind, as in the aurochs ; with the face and figure of the 



* These fossils are so admirably cleared from the hard rock with 

 which they were incrusted (a task of no little labour, and requiring 

 great skill), that I cannot forbear recommending to the notice of any 

 collectors who may require such aid, the person by whom they 

 were chiselled out — James Dew, 25, Harrison Street, Gray's Inn 

 Road. 



M 2 



