XIV. 
INDIAN TERTIARY AND POST-TERTIARY VERTEBRATA. 
are also not wanting certain signs of the connection of the latter with the dogs, 
which are well known to be intimately related to the viverroids; while Otocyon has been 
brought closer to Cams, Cyncelurus to Felis, and Machcerodus to the more primitive 
cats. Thus the impartial study of the previously little-known extinct local members 
of one order of the Mammalia has most decidedly added to the already enormous 
difficulty of interpreting the mutual relations of extinct and existing beings by any 
other hypothelP than that of evolution. 
Perhaps the most important fact in relation to the distribution of the tertiary 
Carnivora is that the Siwalik species of Machcerodus are intermediate between those 
of Europe and those of S. America. As the latter are the most specialized forms of 
the genus, and are found in the pleistocene, while the European forms are the most 
generalized, and usually occur in older strata, it seems probable that the migration 
of the genus took place in an easterly direction from Europe, through Asia, to America. 
Age of lower Siwaliks and European iertiaries . — A word is advisable as to the view 
taken of the age of the lower Siwaliks on page 143. In 1880, Prof. P. M. Duncan 1 
gave a table of the tertiary rocks of Sind in which the lower Manchhars (Siwaliks) 
were considered to be either of upper miocene, or lower pliocene age ; the upper 
Manchhars (Siwaliks) being referred to the pliocene. In a later paper 2 (1881) the 
same writer observed that “ the disassociation of the Manchhar and Grdj series is a 
necessity ; and the nature of the fauna, so singularly allied to that of Pikermi, 
necessitates its relegation to the early Pliocene time.” Although there is a little 
ambiguity in the wording of the sentence, there is no doubt from the context that 
the beds referred to the early pliocene are the lower Manchhars ; and from the use 
of the word 1 necessitates • the present writer felt bound to adopt that view in the 
passage already cited. 3 In the introduction to a still later work by Prof. Duncan, 
Mr. AY. T. Blanford 4 prefers, however, to class the lower Siwaliks as of upper 
miocene age ; remarking that the evidence of the fossil corals and echinoderms of 
Sind is in favour of the classification of the tertiaries in which the lower Siwaliks 
occupy this geological horizon. It is perhaps on the whole inadvisable at present to 
press the question too closely. 
Owing to the recent changes of view as to the age of some of the later tertiary 
faunas of Europe, some difficulty has been found in assigning their proper geological 
ages to many of the European tertiary mammals. In most cases the tables given by 
Prof. Boyd Dawkins 5 have been followed ; but as the lower pliocene of that writer 
does not include the Pikermi beds, 6 these, if referred to the same period, must be 
regarded as an inferior member, which may be called ‘ lowest pliocene.’ The 
Eppelslieim beds are classed as upper, and the Sansan and Simorre beds as middle 
1 “ Pal. Ind.,” Ser. XIV., vol. I., pt. I. (“ Sind Fossil Corals, etc.”) p. 4. 
2 ‘ Quart. Journ. G-eol. Soc.,’ vol. XXXVII., p. 207 : the italics are the present writer’s. 3 The same view has been 
adopted in the writer’s “ Geology of Kashmir ,” 1 Mem. Geol. Surv. Ind.,’ vol. XXII. 
4 “ Pal. Ind.,” ser. XIV., vol. I., pt 4 (“ Fossil Echinoidea of Kachh and Kattywar,” p. 2. 1883.) 
5 Especially the paper in ‘ Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc.,’ vol. XXXVI., p. 379, et. scq. 
6 With these must be classed the beds of Baltavar (Hungary), Mt. Leberon (France), and Concud (Spain). 
