158 
POPULAK SCIENCE REVIEW. 
geographical variety of the Cave Lion should have lived in 
North America during the Post-glacial or Quaternary epoch in 
that area, when we recollect that the Mammoth, Bison, and 
Horse, of the Europaeo-Asiatic post-glacial series have a similar 
range. There is no doubt of the specific identity of the American 
with the European Mammoth. Bison Americanus has been 
found in the fossil state at Bigbone Lick, Kentucky. The 
Bison associated with the American Lion at Natchez is considered 
by Dr. Leidy to belong to a new species. Bison latifrons ; but 
since there is no point of difference between it and the enormous 
Bisons of post-glacial Europe, we cannot agree with him in the 
belief that Baron Cuvier was wrong in ascribing the remains to 
the Aurochs. Equus Americanus does not present any specific 
difference when it is compared with the many forms of the 
European Equus fossilis. 
So far, then, as we have any evidence of the American Lion, 
it is a link in the chain that binds the post-glacial fauna of 
North America to that of Europe and Northern Asia ; and we 
may fairly argue that it bore the same relation to that of the 
European caves as the American to the European Bison, the 
Bear of the barren grounds to that of Europe, or the Canadian 
Elk to that of the Old World. Its occurrence in America is not 
more startling than that of the Musk-sheep in the south of 
France. It extends, however, the range of the Lion eastwards, 
through Kussia and the vast steppes of Northern Asia, across 
Behring’s Straits into the treeless barren grounds of North 
America, and thence southwards into the zone of the woods, and 
over the feeding-grounds of the Bison down to the almost 
tropical region of the Gulf of Mexico. Subsequent investiga- 
tion will probably prove its former existence in the intermediate 
area, as in the case of the Mammoth. What we know of the 
living Carnivores, such as the Wolf, Fox, and Tiger, would 
naturally lead us to expect those found in a fossil condition to 
have a wider range than any of the Herbivora. 
We have already shown that the Lion ranged through North- 
w^estern and Southern Europe, and that it occurs also in the New 
World. In conclusion, we will only add that it was lingering 
in the plains of Thessaly and hills of Macedon when the 
father of liistory wrote his account of the invasion of Greece by 
Xerxes. The last historical notice of its sojourn in Europe is 
that afforded by Aristotle. It became extinct in Europe some 
time between .'130 u.c. and the days of Dio Chrysostom Ehetor 
(a. I). lOf)). The cause of its disappearance from Europe is to 
be attributed to the attacks of the hunter and to the encroach- 
ment of cultivation on its ancient haunts. 
