KUNGL. SV. VET. AKADEMIENS HANDLINGAR. BAND 58. NIO 2. 81 



hoof in the hind foot of tlie foetus of E. a. cyclotis. This foetus of E. a. cottoni exhibits 

 the same feature as can be seen on the plate (Pl. IX). 



Generally it is stated in the textbooks that the African Elephant unlike the Indian 

 only has three hoofs on the hind foot. Lydekker says, 1 however, quite correctty, that 

 there may be either three or four broad flat nails in the hind limb of the African Elephant. 

 The presence of fonr hoofs in the hind feet is evidently a more primitive characteristic 

 than the reduction of these organs to three. In a similar way the oval or rounded ears 

 of the races cyclotis and cottoni must be regarded as representing a more primitive stage 



Fig. 6. Left ear of foetue of Elephas ajricanus cottoni Lydekker. 



than the ears of certain South- and East-African Elephant-races with much enlarged 

 more or less pointed lappets which häng down far below the lower end of the line of in- 

 sertion of the ear. Compared with other African Elephants the two races which bclong 

 to the West African region display thus at least two primitive features in common. 



Judging from a skull of an Elephant killed at the south end of the Albert Nyanza 

 Lydekker has expressed 2 the opinion that this Elephant, which the author quoted has 

 named Elephas ajricanus albertensis, is »the most generalized representative» of African 

 Elephants. The relation between E. a. albertensis and E. a. cottoni does not appear, how- 

 ever to be quite clear as the former name is based on the skull, the latter on the ear, and 

 both may be identical, in which case albertensis has priority. As I have been obliged to 

 base my classifying only on the ear I must for the present, however, use the name cottoni. 



The general appearance of this foetus is well illustrated by Pl. IX. 



It is not hairy except in four places, viz. on the proboscis, on the lower and upper 

 lips, at the eye, and at the tip of the tail. On the proboscis the hairs are comparatively 

 most numerous around the nasal opening. Along the ridge which on either side borders 



1 »The Gamo Animals of Africa. » 



2 Proc. Zool. Soc. London 1907, p. 403. 



K. Sv. Vet. Ältad. Hand). Band 58. N:o. 2. 11 



