the windows have been referred by Dr. Falconer to nine species; viz., three European, and six Indian; but of the European species. one (the Mammoth) is common to the northern parts of Europe, Asia, and America: a skull of this animal, found at Ilford, in Essex, having tusks of ten feet eight inches in length, has been recently set up in the middle of the Room. The Mastodon genus presents three European species (two of which are found in England), three species from India, one from North America, and one from South America. The Mastodon of which the entire skeleton is mounted in Room VI. is of the North American species (Mastodon Ohioticus). All these species of Elephant are extinct; that is to say, none of them resemble either of the two living species, the African and Asiatic Elephants; and of the genus Mastodon there is no living representative. The European Mastodons are found in strata which are more ancient than those which contain the Elephant remains: but the Indian species of Mastodon were coeval with the fossil Elephants from the same country. The two genera, Elephas and Mastodon, have much resemblance in most of the characters exhibited in their skeletons, but they differ considerably in their dentition. In the Elephant the grinding tooth is made up of a number of flattened plates cemented together, each plate being enclosed by enamel; the enamel being considerably harder than the other substances which compose the tooth, wears less readily, and hence projects in the form of transverse ridges on the crown of the tooth, which has been subjected to much attrition. The crown of the tooth in the Mastodons presents, before it is worn, a number of conical prominences, which are more or less united in the transverse direction of the tooth, so as to form high ridges.

Nearly allied to the Mastodons is the extraordinary animal the Dinotherium, of which the skull, lower jaws of individuals of different ages, and detached teeth, will be found in Wall Case No. 2, between the windows. Here it will be seen that the large tusks with which the animal was provided, instead of being in the upper jaw, are implanted in the lower jaw, and are directed downwards.

In Wall Case No. 1 are exhibited fossil remains and casts of large extinct quadrupeds of the Marsupial, or pouched order, which have been recently discovered in Tertiary formations in Australia. Of these the most gigantic is the Diprotodon Australis, the skull of which measures upwards of three feet in length, and exhibits a dentition corresponding, in the number of teeth and in the shape of the grinders, with that of the Kangaroo, but resembling that of the Wombat in the large size and curvature of the front incisors. A fossil lower jaw, and the cast of the skull of a smaller herbivorous marsupial quadruped (Nototherium Mitchelli, Owen), are here shown. The largest aboriginal quadrupeds now known to exist in Australia are the great Kangaroos; and it is to the Kangaroo family that the above-named extinct species present the nearest affinities. In this Case is also placed remains of a large Marsupial Tiger, the Thylacoleo carnifex, from Darling Downs, near Sydney. The remains of the smaller species of Marsupials will be found in Table Case 6, of Room IV.

At the end of the room opposite the entrance doorway, is the Fossil Human Skeleton brought from Guadaloupe in the West Indies by Sir Alexander Cochrane, and presented to the Museum by the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty. Human skeletons are found in the island just mentioned in a solid and very hard limestone rock, which occurs on the sea-shore at the base of the cliffs, and which is more or less covered by the sea at high water. The rock is composed of sand, the detritus of shells and corals of species still inhabiting the adjacent sea; it also contains some species of land shells, identical with those now living on the Island: and, accompanying the skeletons, are found arrow-heads, fragments of pottery, and other articles of human workmanship. Beneath this specimen are placed masses of stalagmite, containing imbedded bones and skulls, the remains of aborigines, from the ossiferous cavern of Bruniquel in the South of France. On the lower shelves of the adjoining case (No. 11) are placed other human remains, together with worked implements of stone and bone, and numerous horns, teeth, and bones of the Reindeer, gigantic Ox, Ibex, Chamois, Wild Horse, Bird's bones, &c., the remains of the animals which served as food for the men of the Flint Period in that part of Europe. These are also from the Bruniquel Cavern.

On the upper shelves of the Cases to the right and left of the Human Skeleton (Cases No. 10 and 11) are arranged numerous mammalian remains from South America.

The lower half of Case No. 11 is devoted to an extensive series of remains of the Pigmy Elephant," discovered by Dr. Leith Adams, in the caverns and fissures of the Island of Malta. These remains belonged to individuals of different ages, from the young to the adult, and furnish evidence of the former existence in Malta of a race of Elephants which, as compared with the living species, were of exceedingly diminutive size.

GEORGE R. WATERHOUSE.

NORTH GALLERY.

THE six rooms forming the North Gallery are numbered over the doorways. The first four of these rooms contain sixty large and four small Table Cases in which the Collection of Minerals is displayed, besides two Cases containing the Meteorites. The Wall Cases and a few small Table Cases in these Rooms, and the whole space in Rooms V. and VI. are devoted to Fossils.

DEPARTMENT OF MINERALOGY.

The sixty large Table Cases containing the Minerals are numbered consecutively. Commencing at the east end of the Gallery in Room I. and passing down the south side of the four rooms, the numbers return up the north side, the sixtieth table standing opposite to the first. Corresponding with this order of the numbers on the Table Cases is that of the Minerals arranged in them.

The following sketch will serve to indicate the general features of the arrangement, and, by giving the numbers of the particular Table Cases, through which the principal divisions, sections, &c., are distributed, it will serve as a guide for finding any particular Minerals. The names of the species, as well as of important varieties, will be found within the Table Cases, associated with the Minerals to which they belong.

66

At the eastern end of Room I., adjoining the wall, are two glazed Cases. In these, the important Collection of Meteorites is displayed. In Case A. are seen the stony varieties, the Aerolites." Of these there are a large number characterised by the presence of minute stony spherules. They are the "Chondritic" Aerolites: they all contain meteoric iron in fine particles disseminated through them, and the more chondritic varieties are on the left hand side of the Case. Among other kinds of aërolites the carbonaceous stones that fell at Cold Bokkeveldt, Kaba, Grosnja, and Montauban, on the right hand end of this Case, are remarkable. So is the great chondritic aërolite that fell at Parnallee, in Madras, on February 28, 1857; presented to the Museum by Sir Wm. Denison, the Governor of that Presidency. The stone that fell at Busti on December 2, 1852, is also in this Case. It is remarkable for containing crystalline calcium sulphide, associated with Enstatite and Augite.

In Case B. are displayed, on the left extremity of the Case, the Siderolites, while the rest of the space is occupied by the Aëro-siderites. The former are masses of meteoric iron containing stony matter; the

latter consist of the metallic alloys of iron and nickel with small amounts of other metals, known as "meteoric iron." They also contain mechanical admixtures of compounds of these metals with phosphorus, and also with sulphur. Among the specimens of the former class, is the mass found at Breitenbach in Bohemia, in 1861. It contains Silica crystallised as Asmanite in the orthorhombic system, associated with a ferriferous Enstatite (Bronzite), that is in some cases well crystallised. The crystalline structure of the meteoric iron masses is effectively shown by the etching of their polished surfaces. In this case are seen two small but very interesting iron meteorites, the falls of which were witnessed; the one on Jan. 23, 1870, at Nedagolla, in Vizagapatam, India; the other at Rowton, in Shropshire, on the 20th of April, 1876. On the north side of this room is the vast mass of meteoric iron found at Cranbourne, near Melbourne, in Australia, presented by James Bruce, Esq., and weighing above 3 tons. At the east end of the gallery is one weighing 1,400lbs., presented by Sir Woodbine Parish, found on the Gran Chaco, South America; and adjoining it is another mass cf iron of nearly 5 cwt., from the Desert of Bolson de Mapimi, Mexico, supposed to have fallen in 1837.

The Collection of Minerals is arranged in four principal Divisions. These are

DIVISION I. The Native Elements.

Cases 1, 2, 3, 4 (i.)

DIVISION II. The Compounds of Metals, with elements of the Arsenic Group (the Arsenoid elements, viz. Bismuth, Antimony, and Arsenic); or with elements of the Sulphur Group (the Thionids, viz. Tellurium, Selenium, and Sulphur); or with elements belonging to both groups. Cases 4 (ii.) to 12 inclusive.

DIVISION III. The Compounds of Metals with elements of the Chlorine Group (the Halogen elements-Iodine, Bromine, Chlorine and Fluorine). Cases 13 and 14.

DIVISION IV. Compounds of elements with Oxygen. Cases 15 to 60.

These Divisions are again subdivided into sections and classes, the latter embracing the minerals which fall under the same general chemical denomination; as, for instance, the salts of the same acid or of a group of acids chemically and crystallographically equivalent to each other. Each class is further separated into distinct chemical series, the minerals included in any series being such as are designated by the same or equivalent typical formulæ. Subordinated to this chemical system of classification is the final distribution of the several homotypical species of each chemical series, into distinct crystallographic series, arranged according to the crystalline system to which they belong; the order of sequence of these systems being-1st, the Cubic System; 2nd, the Dimetric or Pyramidal System; 3rd, the Trimetric or Ortho

Div. I.

Cases 1, 2, 3, 4 (i.)

Cases 1, 2.

Case 2.

rhombic System; 4th, the Hexagonal or Rhombohedral System; 5th, the Oblique or Clinorhombic System; 6th, the Anorthic System; and finally, Amorphous substances, that either present no crystalline forms, or the forms of which, if they be crystalline, are not determinable. In the following observations the term " group " will be reserved to connect Minerals, whether individual species, series, or classes, which present such a community of physical and other characters as imparts to them a sort of family resemblance.

DIVISION I. THE NATIVE ELEMENTS.

In Cases 1, 2, 3, and the first half of 4, are arranged such of the elementary forms of matter as are found occurring in nature in the uncombined state. These native elements, which form but a small proportion of those the chemist has eliminated from the Mineral Kingdom, are arranged in sections, of which the first is that of the native metals and their alloys.

Of the series of native metals crystallising in the cubic system the various forms of Copper, Silver, and Gold are the most important; and crystals of these metals are exhibited, remarkable for the perfection of their forms, or conspicuous for their size. The crystallised copper from Siberia and from Lake Superior, the silver in crystals from Kongsberg and from Freiberg, the suite of specimens of gold from Merionethshire and other British localities, two unique nuggets of crystallized gold from the MacIvor Diggings, in Australia, and one from California, are especially worthy of remark. Besides these, will also be seen native foil of silver and of gold: moss-like filamentary aggregations of copper and of silver; nuggets, and washed grains of gold, and specimens of all these metals, in which a simple crystalline form, by being repeated or prolonged along particular axes has built up dendritic, ramose, capillary, and other singular kinds of structure. Among the specimens of gold and of electrum, or argentiferous gold rich in silver, from Transylvania, are some worthy of notice from the sharpness of their crystalline forms. Native lead from Sweden, and a crystalline nugget of platinum containing metallic iron and presenting magnetic polarity, given by H. I. H. the Grand Duke of Leuchtenberg, are exhibited in Case 3. The rhombohedral series of metals includes an isomornamely, Arsenic, Antimony, and Bismuth, with which its crystalline form, rather than its chemical analogies, associates the rare native element Tellurium.

Case 3 (i.) phous group the Arsenoids

Case 3 (ii.)

Next to the metals are arranged the Metalloids, a section including the carbon group and the sulphur group. In the former, elementary Carbon is illustrated in its two allotropic mineral forms: Diamond and Graphite. Of the Diamond, a large and extremely choice series of crystals is exhibited, together with models of the most famous for their size and history of the specimens of this, the hardest and most resplendent of gems. Specimens of the diamonds of South Africa are exhibited with the rock in which they are found.