Page:Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, vol. 27.djvu/553

1871.] to time a remarkably complete series of pleistocene mammals. That which opens on the terraced side of the cliff in the grounds of Cefn, first described by the Rev. E. Stanley in 1833, and subsequently by Dr. Falconer, contained abundance of Reindeer, associated with Cave-lion, Cave-bear, Grizzly Bear, Hyæna, Elephas antiquus, Hippopotamus major, Rhinoceros tichorhinus, and R. hemitœchus. And nearly all these animals occurred in a second cave, at Cefn, explored by Mr. Williams Wynn in 1869–70. A third cave, at Galtfaenan, explored last winter by Mr. Mainwaring and Mr. Hughes, has furnished the remains of Reindeer and Bear, and the traces of Hyænas; while a fourth, at Plas Heaton, in part dug out by Mr. Hughes and Mr. Heaton, has yielded Wolf, Bison, Reindeer, Horse, and Cave-bear, and a remarkably fine lower jaw which proves that the Glutton inhabited Great Britain during the pleistocene, or quaternary age. Mr. Ayshford Sanford and myself had, indeed, obtained, in 1865, the crowns of three canines from the caves of Banwell, and Bleadon, and of Gower, which belonged to this animal; and we accordingly inserted it, without figure or description, in the list of the British Pleistocene Mammals, published by the Palæontographical Society in 1866. This discovery at Plas Heaton renders any doubt as to its being a true pleistocene British species altogether impossible.

The jaw consists of the left ramus, docked of the angular and articular portions, which are broken off close behind the first true molar. On comparison with the lower jaws of the Glutton in the British Museum, from Norway, and also from the caves of Gailenreuth and Sundwig, I find that the Welsh specimen is slightly larger than the latter, and considerably larger than those of the animal now living in Europe. With this exception, there is not the slightest difference between them. The peculiar ridging and grooving of the inner side of the alveolar border, which at first sight appears as the accidental result of the inflammation of the periosteum, is common to all which I have examined; and, taken in combination with the great alveolar width, affords a means of determining at once a fragment of the jaw from that of any other animal. The premolar and molar series, also, are crowded together in a very short alveolar space, and occupy the upper and outer margin of the jaw, instead of occupying its superior surface, as in the majority of the carnivores. The peculiar wrinkled pattern of the enamel separates the teeth at once from those of any carnivore which are likely to be confounded with them, except the Hyæna, which is put out of court by the larger size and different form of all its teeth except the upper incisor 3, and the first upper premolar. The first of these bears a strong superficial resemblance to the canine of the Glutton, but is differentiated by the enamel surface of the latter being more deeply and irregularly grooved, and by the cingulum passing from the posterior to the anterior ridge being much less prominently developed. The upper premolar 1 of Hyæna can be determined at once from the second lower premolar of the Glutton, which it closely resembles in its single fang and procumbent form, by the crown of the latter being set