| OCR Text |
Show 1904.] PECULIARITIES IN CERTAIN MAMMALS. 421 described upper canines, which do not cut the gum, in the young males of the Abyssinian Antelope, Ourebia montana (Riipp.). Riippell stated expressly that the young females are destitute of them *. In a very young Saiga Antelope, A. Nehring describes and figures a left-side canine lying in a shallow furrow of the maxillary. It is supposed that somewhat later the maxillary would have formed a regular alveolus; this is, however, unlikely. On the right side there was equally a shallow furrow, but the tooth was wanting t. H. Nitsche describes in the macerated skull of a few months' old female Chamois (Rupicapra rupicapra) a distinct alveolus, 8 millim. long, of the upper canine which apparently had not cut the gum. The tooth had been lost during maceration }. A. Nehring mentions in the skull of a young Indian Antelope, Antilope cervicapra, "two well-developed canines in the maxillary "§. N o other particulars are given. Two skulls of a few days' old specimen of an Antelope from Obock, unknown to the writer, M . Heude, showed each a pair of small procumbent canines directed forwards. The skull of a half-adult specimen had preserved the canine, enclosed in the borders of the maxillary ("encastree dans les bords maxillaires") ||. The same observer mentions that one of four skulls of Neotragus, age not stated, showed the two canines broken at their " collet" 51. I append the result of a very cursory review of the Antelope-skulls in the Natural History Museum, made with the intelligent help of M r . 0. Thomas's young assistant, M r . E. C. C h u b b : - (1) Dry skull of Mdcloqita philippsi Thos. (No. 99.12.28.4). N o sex stated. Very young specimen; the three deciduous molars and m . 1 are in situ, all four scarcely worn. On the left side of the maxillary is present a somewhat laterally compressed upper canine, which certainly had not cut the gum. The right-side alveolus is empty. (2) Dry skull of half-adult $ of Madoqua kirkii (Giinth.), No. 1720 B (79.12.18.1), one of the types of Giinther's Neotragus kirkii, from South Somali. The much-worn deciduous molars are in place, as well as the two anterior true molars. The partly obliterated alveoli of the upper canines are visible on the anterior tapering terminations of the maxillary. (3) Dry skull of young Neotragus pygmceus (" Nanotragus jyerpusillus") from Fantee, No. 73.6.22.11. Deciduous molars and m. 1 in place. The upper canines are present; they are placed almost vertically in the jaw and, being worn, had no doubt functioned. (4) Young $ of Gazella picticauda (Hodgs.), the Himalayan * P. Z. S. London, part iv. 1836, pp. 3, 4. f Sitzgsber. Ges. nat. Fr. Berlin, 20 Febr. 1883, p. 13. X Tharander forstl. Jahrb. 1883,2. p. 23 (of separate), footnote. § Op. cit. 21 Oct. 1884, p. 136. i| Meinoires cone. 1'Hist. Nat. de l'Empire Chinoia, ii. 4. p. 191, ftn. 2 (1894). 1" Id. ib. 28* |
