Professor Owen has thus forcibly illustrated the Carnivorous Animals
which preyed upon and restrained the undue multiplication of the
vegetable feeders. First we have the bear family, which is now
represented in this country only by the badger. We were once blest,
however, with many bears. One species seems to have been identical
with the existing brown bear of the European continent. Far larger
and more formidable was the gigantic cave-bear (_Ursus spelæus_),
which surpassed in size his grisly brother of North America. The
skull of the cave-bear differs very much in shape from that of its
small brown relative just alluded to; the forehead, in particular,
is much higher,--to be accounted for by an arrangement of air-cells
similar to those which we have already remarked in the elephant. The
cave-bear has left its remains in vast abundance in Germany. In our own
caves, the bones of hyænas are found in greater quantities. The marks
which the teeth of the hyæna make upon the bones which it gnaws are
quite unmistakable. Our English hyænas had the most undiscriminating
appetite, preying upon every creature, their own species amongst
others. Wolves, not distinguishable from those which now exist in
France and Germany, seem to have kept company with the hyænas; and the
_Felis spelæa_, a sort of lion, but larger than any which now exists,
ruled over all weaker brutes. Here, says Professor Owen, we have the
original British Lion. A species of _Machairodus_ has left its remains
at Kent’s Hole, near Torquay. In England we had also the beaver, which
still lingers on the Danube and the Rhone, and a larger species, which
has been called Trogontherium (gnawing beast), and a gigantic mole.