. The Annals and magazine of natural history; zoology, botany, and geology. Natural history; Zoology; Botany; Geology. 180 Dr. J. Murie on the Hor?is, Viscera, scription. The second clearly establishes intervention of fibro- cartilaginous matrix between the skull and the partially porous osseous substance of the horn. The first brings out the rough irregularly channelled exterior. The existence of a third or median horn in the giraffe has likewise been a subject of controversy among anatomists. By some this peculiar middle frontal elevation has been regarded as but an osseous eminence, and not
. The Annals and magazine of natural history; zoology, botany, and geology. Natural history; Zoology; Botany; Geology. 180 Dr. J. Murie on the Hor?is, Viscera, scription. The second clearly establishes intervention of fibro- cartilaginous matrix between the skull and the partially porous osseous substance of the horn. The first brings out the rough irregularly channelled exterior. The existence of a third or median horn in the giraffe has likewise been a subject of controversy among anatomists. By some this peculiar middle frontal elevation has been regarded as but an osseous eminence, and not representative of an ab- normally 2)laced additional horn. Other authorities have not hesitated to class it as analogous to the rearmost pair, though developed over the sagittal suture, and short and squat. My colleague Dr. Cobbold * has been at some pains to collate the statements of several excellent zoologists and anatomists, which sustain his independent observation—viz. that the anterior median prominence of the girafie's skull, situate at the junction of the nasals and prefrontals and over the sagittal suture, is a separate indejiendent structure, analogous there- fore to the so-called hinder horns. Tlie proofs of its separate ossification and, therefore, epi- physial nature, which I advance in support of those who maintain such a view, rest chiefly on two specimens—one a section of the skull of the young animal already referred to {vide infra) J the other a completely ossified cap removed from the cranium of an adult. In the calf stage, complete absence of bone or germ of ossific centre is indubitable, a thickening of the periosteum alone denoting the future position of the subsidiary piece in question. My sketch from the fresh speci- men (fig. 3), whilst substantiating Dr. Cobbold's observation on the immature giraffe, more clearly displays the sti'uctural condition of the parts than in his diagram [1. c. p. 15). Fig. Lono-itudinal vertical section of tlie mid
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