Andrew Leith Adams

“ The Red Deer, like the Roebuck, the Mole, and the Water Rat, is one of the few survivors of the extensive list of mammals which inhabited Great Britain during the Pliocene epoch—i.e. the epoch which immediately preceded the glacial period. Their pedigrees, therefore, are as ancient as any in the land—at all events, so far as the discovery of fossil relics is concerned; but in all probability neither of the two first-named would have survived but for the protective influence of man. ”

“ Spondylus quinquecostatus, or else a very closely allied species, is common to the Upper and Lower Limestones besides the Calcareous Sandstone. But the characteristic and most plentiful fossils, especially in the uppermost portions of the Lower Limestone, are casts of Conus, some of large size, and other genera not sufficiently preserved to admit of specific determination, among others Haliotis, of which there are apparently more than one species; indeed the genus is represented in all the formations. ”

“ No judgment could be formed from Sicilian deposits, as there seemed to have been no connexion between the islands; and with regard to the Maltese deposits, he stated that remains of Hippopotamus were found in breccia and in conglomerates in rock-cavities which appeared to have been caves, and also in fissures with red soil like that of the surface, containing angular fragments of the parent rock. In one cavity he found whole carcasses of Elephants, just as if they had been carried in suddenly, and filled in with earth by a wave. ”

“ Not only does historical evidence, accompanied by the discovery of its bones in peat and alluvium, point to the existence of the Brown Bear in unrecorded times, but we find its bones, associated with those of at all events very much larger species, in the caverns and deep soils of England; moreover, seeing that the remains in either case represent very old individuals, and that the teeth and bones differ in many respects, there is good cause to believe in the former existence in Great Britain of at least two species of Bear. ”

“ The genus Pecten, so plentiful in the Maltese Miocene, is represented in the Sand bed by four species, also met with in the Upper Limestone. Of the Brachiopoda, Terebratula sinuosa and Megerlia truncata are common to both formations, besides nine species of Echinodermata, whilst nearly all the Polyzoa, Cœlcnterata, and Protozoa seem undistinguishable.
III. The Marl bed varies very much in thickness, thinning out for a depth of upwards of a hundred feet to scarcely an indication of its presence. It is the most perishable of the beds, and is being rapidly denuded. ”

“ No doubt failure of food has brought about the extinction of many species, and in the case of the British Islands, even supposing man had not appeared on the scene, the severance from the Continent must have initiated a struggle for existence among the larger quadrupeds, of which the fittest only would survive. The great Cave Bear and the Grisly, not to mention the Lion and Hyæna, must have been formidable enemies to the deer and wild oxen ”

“ The internal border is sharp, and the outer is thick and round. The circumference of the bone just below the lip of the glenoid cavity is 97 millims.
The coracoid, as in the last, was not ankylosed to the scapula, which appears to have belonged to a full-grown tortoise of much smaller dimensions than the owners of any of the bones yet described. For that reason, and, as will be shown in the sequel, from its relationship as regards relative size with other bones, I am disposed to consider that it belonged to a distinct form or species rather than to a small individual or female of T. robusta. ”

“ The Sharks' remains are the most varied and numerous of all the vertebrates of the Maltese Miocene. Their teeth have found their way into almost every public collection in Europe, and continue to furnish employment to persons who make it their business to dispose of them to travellers. With the exception of the Upper Lime- stone, they have been found in all the beds. From a large experience in collecting and determining the Maltese species, I have been enabled to furnish the following Table of their stratigraphical distribution. ”

“ Of its contemporaneous existence with man in Europe, we have evidence not only in the discovery of stone implements along with its remains, but a few years since a fragment of the tusk of a Mammoth was found in the cave of La Madelaine in the Dordogne, on which was a rude but faithful representation of this hairy Elephant, etched by means of the stone implement of some cave dweller of the period, when, together with the Reindeer and the Bear, it roamed over Southern France. ”

“ The following establishes their proportional greater thickness as compared with certain recent species that I have been enabled to examine:—
Thus it appears that the smallest girth of the shaft in T. robusta is greater than that of the tibia of the more slender T. ephippium, which is 2⋅2 inches longer, and that, whilst the antero-posterior diameter of the femoral articulation is 41 millimetres in T. robusta, it is 38 millimetres in T. ephippium; but their distal articulations are about equal in size. ”

“ Sometimes the Upper Limestone gradually merges into a black indurated sand composed of particles of glauconite, felspar, topaz, &c, which forms a variegated bed made up of black, green, brown, and red sands intermixed and stratified. This variety is well seen on the scarp of the hill of Chelmus in Gozo, where it is fully 30 feet in thickness. Altogether the greatest depth attained by the Sand bed may be little less than 60 feet. ”

“ All were contemporaneous here long after the separation of Great Britain from the Continent, and gradually died off, it may be from failure of food or through human agency. Looking to the habits and food of living species, it is apparent that the Bear would survive the Lion, for the reason that it is not entirely dependent on flesh for its subsistence, but will eat vegetable food—indeed, many species prefer it to animal food; consequently the Lion may have died of starvation in Great Britain when the Deer and other prey became very scarce. ”