FALCONER ON THE AMERICAN FOSSIL ELEPHANT. 71 
rhinus, or Hippopotamus major , which are found along with the early 
form of the Mammoth, in the pre-glacial ‘ forest-bed’ of the Norfolk 
coast, or in the volcanic gravels around Rome. 
The authors of the ‘ Geology of Russia ’ have, in their great 
work, investigated with much ability, the nature and origin of the 
auriferous gravels in which Mammoth bones occur, on the flanks of 
the Ural mountains. They infer that the species had existed for a 
long course of ages upon the adjoining high lands, when the low 
region now skirting the Polar Sea was submerged; that the vast 
quantities of fossil bones found near the mouth of these rivers, are 
the result of the secular accumulation, during a long period, of car¬ 
casses floated by floods from the highlands into the great estuaries ; 
and that the last elevations of the Urals, which led to the production of 
gold veins, were probably the chief causes that conduced to the final 
destruction of the Mammoth in Siberia.* But the leading general 
fact, observed with regard to the Siberian fossil Pauna, holds equally 
good of that of the auriferous gravel-deposits, of local origin, on the 
flanks of the Urals: Elephas primigenius , Rhinoceros tichorhinus , 
Bison priscus, Equus, &c., are the prevailing forms. Not an instance 
has been adduced of the older associates of the Mammoth, above- 
mentioned, having been found among these remains. E. primigenius 
has become extinct in the swamps of North America, and in the 
valley of the Tiber, where auriferous gravels, and Ural upheavements, 
had no share in producing the effect. The disappearance of the 
species must be sought for in causes of a more general scope. 
M. Lartet, in his very able and suggestive essay ‘ On the Ancient 
Migration’ of the existing Mammiferous Pauna of Europe,t takes the 
inference of these authors as his starting point, and carries it further 
than appears to have been intended by them. He avers that the 
remains of E. primigenius and Rhinoceros tichorhinus , have nowhere, 
in Europe, been discovered, except in deposits of a more modern age 
than the Northern drift; and that these species did not make their 
appearance among us, until after the emergence of the drift-covered 
plains of western Russia, at the close of the Glacial period; in short, 
that the Pauna was first, tertiary , in the north of Asia, and then 
became quaternary in Europe. But this very ingenious argument, is 
at once negatived by the fact, that we have unquestionable evidence, 
that the Mammoth existed in England before the deposition of the 
‘ Boulder-clay,’ as the cotemporary of Mammalian species, handed 
down from the Pliocene period. 
On a review of the data which we possess, at the present time, it 
would appear, that there is not a tittle of proof, that E. primigenius 
has been met with anywhere in Europe or Asia, in deposits of an 
older date than the ‘ Porest-bed’ of the Norfolk coast. The Mam- 
* ‘ Geology of Russia in Europe,’ &c. p. 492, et seq. 
f Comptes Rendus, tom. xlvi. Seance 22, Eevrier 1858. 
