9 



Fossil Jaw of a Mammoth. 



BirC. D. GIBBES, C. E,, OCTOBER 2, 1882. 



When at the State Prison at Carson in July last, Maj. Garrard stated that 

 he understood that a part of a mammoth jaw found there previous to his 

 taking charge, had been given to Mr. J. D. Minor Secretary of State, and 

 that he would try and find out what had become of it. 



On the 1st of September I received a note from Miss Kate Garrard (who 

 takes a great interest in the foot-prints, and keeps me advised of any discov- 

 eries), stating that her father had received a letter from Mr. Minor, saying 

 that when he left Carson his cabinet of minerals together with the jaw, had 

 been sold to Mr. Wells, a Methodist minister living in Napa. I then wrote 

 to Mr. Wells to know if he would present or loan it to the Academy, and in 

 answer he said that he had given it to the University of the Pacific near San 

 Jose, and that it was the jaw found at the State Prison. 



I then asked Mr. Harford as Director of the Museum, to write to the Uni- 

 versity and request the loan of it, which he did, and received an answer 

 from Mr. T. C. George, Professor of Natural History, complying with our 

 request, and we received the specimen about ten days since, which we ex- 

 hibit this evening You will see that it is only a portion of the right side of 

 the lower jaw, and that half of the tooth is broken off, evidently by the work- 

 men, and that a piece of the sandstone still adheres to the jaw next to the 

 tooth; it appears to me to be either a grinder of the Elephas Americanus or 

 Elephas intermedius, and not the Elephas primigenius. 



It will be seen that the cylinders of enamel-covered dentine standing verti- 

 cal to the grinding surface, consists of only six groups left on the fragment 

 of this tooth, and that the space occupied by the substance called cementum, 

 by which all of the groups are cemented together is much wider than the 

 space between the groups of the primigenius. and that this tooth corres- 

 ponds more with the teeth of the Elephas Americanus or the Elephas inter- 

 medius. But I leave it for others better able to decide to which species it 

 belongs. 



• We have here for your inspection three specimens belonging to the Acad- 

 emy, for comparison; one is the lower jaw of an Elephas primigenius from 

 Alaska; one, a tooth of the Elephas Americanus from this State, and a cast 

 of a tooth of the Elephas intermedius, found in France. 



In the specimen from the State Prison, the porous portion of the jaw 

 bone is filled with small brown crystals of calcite, and in a cavity in the 



