204 



placed low down : it communicates with the temporal fossa, and has its 

 posterior boundary indicated by the post-orbital process above and a 

 process from the malar bone below : the zygomatic arches are so much 

 expanded posteriorly that the breadth of the skull at that part equals nearly 

 half its length. The auditory or tympanic aperture is small and situated 

 as in the Tapir, indicating that the ears were attached low down in the 

 living Palaeothere. The incisors are not preserved in the present specimen ; 

 but other examples proved them to have been six in number in the upper 

 jaw, three in each intermaxillary bone, as in the Tapir. The canine is 

 slightly curved with a conical crown, trenchant posteriorly ; a short 

 diastema divides it from the 6rst molar tooth : the seven teeth of this 

 series, consisting of four premolars and three true molars, are present 

 here ; they gradually augment in size as they are situated further back. 

 The first has a simple compressed crown, the rest have a square-shaped 

 crown, with three longitudinal or vertical ridges and two concavities on 

 the outside, and a single furrow on the inside. Cuvier concludes from the 

 structure of this fossil, that, notwithstanding the minor elevation of the 

 cranium and the greater length of the nasal bones, the skull of the Pa- 

 lseotherium bears most resemblance to that of the Tapir. 



The original of the present beautifvd cast was obtained from the gyp- 

 sum of Montmartre, and was disencumbered of its stony matrix by the 

 patience and skill of M. Laurillard. Cuvier justly regarded it as the 

 most precious of the fossils from the Paris basin which enrich the Royal 

 Museum. It is described at p. 33, and figured in plates 53 and 54 of 

 the above -cited edition of the ' Ossemens Fossiles.' 



Presented by Baron Cuvier. 



831. The left ramus, with the symphysis and part of the right ramus, of the 

 lower jaw of the same individual Palasotherium crassum as the foregoing 

 cranium. Both canines and the entire series of molars of the left side 

 are present in this specimen : the crown of the first molar is simple and 

 trenchant : the enamel is disposed on the grinding surface of the five 

 following teeth in two crescents, one before the other, with their con- 

 vexity turned outwards, and which by trituration become double crescentic 



