﻿CANIS. 7 



Ballynamintra cave, co. Waterford, which he attributed to the Irish wolf-hound. 

 There can be little doubt that all these are of post-Pleistocene date, and belong to 

 the Prehistoric period. 



Numerous bones, clearly of dogs, have been found in peat and other Prehistoric 

 deposits in many parts of Great Britain, especially in the alluvium of the lower 

 part of the Thames valley. 



The Fox (Cards vulpes). 



The occurrence of the fox in the Red Crag is well authenticated, a well-pre- 

 served palate from Boyton in Suffolk having been figured and described by 

 Lydekker. 1 He gives measurements showing that its size considerably exceeds 

 that of a full-grown recent specimen, but in spite of this concludes that the 

 specimen is to be referred to the fox — an opinion in which he is supported by 

 Newton. 



The evidence for the occurrence of the fox in the Forest Bed is not very good. 

 It is based on part of a humerus which Newton 3 hesitated to refer to the fox. 

 Lydekker, however, thought that the specimen was correctly referred to this 

 species. 



From Pleistocene times onwards the distribution of the fox throughout the 

 British Isles has been practically universal. In the cavern deposits its distribution 

 shows a remarkable correspondence with that of the wolf (see Table, p. 10). 



The Arctic Fox (Cants lag opus). 



As yet the remains of the Arctic fox have been recognised at only a very few 

 localities in Britain. The earliest record is that of Busk 3 (1875), who found 

 among the bones from the rock fissures of the Creswell Crags an axis vertebra 

 which he carefully described and figured, referring it to the Arctic fox on account 

 of (1) its small size ; (2) the slenderness and abrupt divergence of the transverse 

 processes; (3) the prominence of the median keel on the ventral surface of the 

 centrum ; (4) a difference in the form of the anterior articular facets from those in 

 the common fox. 



The second record is by Newton, 4 from the Ightham fissure near Maidstone. 

 Newton figured and ascribed to the Arctic fox a femur, a tibia, a humerus, a 

 mandibular ramus, and part of the upper jaw. Many other bones of the Arctic 

 fox from the same locality are in the collections of Dr. F. Corner, of Poplar, and 



1 ' G-eol. Mag.,' dec. iii, i, 1884, p. 443. n - Ibid., dec. ii, vii, 1880, p. 152. 



3 ' Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc.,' xxxi, 1875, pp. 685—687. 



4 Ibid., 1, 1894, p. 202, pi. xii, figs 5—9. 



