780 
PROFESSOR OWEN ON PORTIONS OF 
confirmations of the previously hugest known extinct Marsupial, ultimately establishing 
the ordinal, generic, and specific characters of Diprotodon australis , of which the 
primal indication was but a portion of a tusk.* This tusk, however, was evidently 
one of a pair which had issued in an almost horizontal direction from the symphysis 
of the lower jaw : and both incisors had been partially coated with true enamel. 
Such indication bespoke a species akin to the still existing pouched quadrupeds of 
Australia, represented by the Wombats and Kangaroos. 
The initial fossil, large as it seemed, proved afterwards to be part of an immature 
individual. It was obtained, as is well known, from a cavern, which had been haunted 
by the largest known marsupial Carnivore {Thylacoleo) ; and the relations to the 
locality and companion fossils recalled those of the remains of Elephants and Rhin¬ 
oceroses which have been a prey to spelaean Lions haunting the caves in our own 
island. 
And here I may remark that the cave in Wellington Yalley, originally discovered 
and explored by Major Sir Thomas Mitchell, F.G.S., has since, by the enlightened 
liberality of the Government of New South Wales, been subjected to a more searching 
exploration by the accomplished naturalist and curator of the Museum of Natural 
History at Sydney, Ed. P. Ramsay, F.L.S. 
Among the additional evidences of the Thylacoleo —the only carnivore to which 
could be referred the introduction of immature Diprotodons whose remains showed 
indications that they had fallen a prey—was a portion of the cranium with the 
articular cavity for the lower jaw. This, instead of the shallow undulatory surface of 
the vegetarian Marsupials, showed the deep transversely extended groove for the 
reception of the transversely extended fore-and-aft convexity of the mandibular con¬ 
dyle : the joint thus conforming, as in the Felines, with the carnassial character of the 
dentition of Thylacoleo. 
As, year by year, further evidences arrived contributing to the restoration of 
Diprotodon , it may be hoped that similar materials for the reconstruction of Notelephas 
australis may reach this country. 
* Appendix to £ Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia,’ by Sir Thomas Mitchell, 
F.G.S., Surveyor-General of Australia; vol. ii., 8vo., 1838, plate 31, fig. 1. 
