PROFESSOR OWEX ON THE FOSSIL MAMMALS OF AUSTRALL\. 



255 



*' contest for existence The small bun-owing Kivisf, like the small Wombats, have 

 survived. Phascolomys gigas and Phascolomys magnus are not likely to have escaped 

 observation if they still lingered in any of the localities made known by the adventurous 

 explorers of Australia ; but the diminutive Phase, jjarvus may yet be found living in 

 some part of that continent. 



Another inference, or tributary illustration of a general law, is shadowed forth less 

 plainly, perhaps, than that bearing upon the " battle of life." 



The majority of the fossils of common-sized Wombats exemplify, as in the case of 

 Phascolomys MitcheUi, the more generalized sl^'ucture ; osteological characters, now 

 distinguishing respectively the hairy-nosed and bare-nosed Wombats, are combined in 

 the skull of that extinct species. At the same time divergent courses of variation had 

 reached the stages indicated by Phascolomys latifrons and Phascolomys ^latyrhinus at a 

 period when the larger species, now extinct, appear to have been living in Australia. 

 This is less ambiguously shown, as to time, by the mandible of the continental bare-nosed 

 Wombat from Queensland, than by that of the hairy-nosed species from the breccia of 

 the Wellington- Valley Caverns; for, with regard to specimens obtained from caves, 

 there are grounds of uncertainty as to contemporaneity of introduction not affecting, 

 at least in the same degree, the fossils from stratified deposits of known geological age. 



The extirpating cause of the larger Wombats, especially if they were unable to take 

 refuge and conceal themselves under ground, was probably the hostility of man. Xo 

 human remains, however, or weapons have yet been discovered in the substalagmitic 

 breccias of the caves or in the freshwater deposits of Australia, But as the unseen 

 planet is inferred by evidence of its force, so may the destroyer be conjectured and his 

 discovery anticipated by the effects of his power ; such, e. y., as the disappearance of 

 species which, from their easier detection, capture, or bringing to bay, and greater profit 

 when slain, would be the first objects of chase to the primitive Aborigines. 



Table of Localities of Fossils of Phascolomys^ showing : — 



Where found. 



By whom. 



Date. 1 Sjjecies. 



Lacustrine deposits, Victoria 



Lacustrine deposits, Queensland 



Growrie, Darling Dgwns 



St. Jean Station, Darling Downs 



Breccia-cavern, Wellington Vallev 



Geo. Bennett, M.D., F.L.S 



Edward S. Hill, Esq 



Prof. Thom.«on, and Grerard Ejeflft, Esq. ... 



183G 

 1845 

 18tU 

 1847 

 1861 



1865 



1805 



1864 



1866 



1867 



Phascohmjs Mitchdli, 



Ph. giga.?. 



Ph. MitcheUi. 



Ph. parvus, Ph. medius. 



Ph. MitchelU. 



( Ph. platyrhinus, Ph. medius, 

 \ Ph. magnus. Ph. gigas. 

 Ph. gigas. 



(Ph. ThomHrnii, Ph. medius, 

 \ Ph. magnus. Ph. gigas. 

 Ph. gigas. 



[Ph. MitcheUi, Ph. Krefftii, 

 \ Ph. krifrons, Ph. medius. 



* OwEX, " On Dinomis," Part FT., Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. iv. (1S50) p. 15. 

 t Avterux australis, Shaw Apteryx Owenii, Gould. 



