376 VIEW OF THE FAUNA OF BRAZIL 



future opportunity the consideration of some of the weight- 

 iest consequences that result from this fact. 



Turning next to the genera belonging to the extinct 

 fauna which are no longer found in this district, we are 

 able to separate them also tolerably well into two divisions ; 

 of which the first will contain those that have entirely dis- 

 appeared from the earth's surface, and the other those which 

 still exist, but at a greater or lesser distance from the spot 

 where their remains are now discovered. The former of 

 these divisions includes ten genera — Euryodon, Heterodon, 

 Chlamydotherium, Hoplophorus^ Pachytherium, Coelodon, 

 Megalonyx, Leptotherium, Mastodon, and Protopithecus, 

 If now we consider more closely the genera comprised in 

 this division, we find that far the greatest proportion of them 

 belong to the order of sloths {Bruta), and that they are 

 composed of large clumsy animals, whose extraordinary in- 

 harmonious organization seems to have contained the seed 

 of its destruction. The second of these divisions is com- 

 posed of only four genera — Antelope, Camel, Bear, and 

 Hycena; but the existence of these animals in the Brazilian 

 highlands in the former period is a phaenomenon of the 

 highest interest, and calculated to awaken the most import- 

 ant considerations. I have shown that the fossil species of 

 Camel belonged unquestionably to the under-group of Auche- 

 nias, and that we therefore have to seek the modern habitat 

 of this form in the chain of the Andes ', also that the fossil 

 species of Bear seems in like manner most to resemble 

 those which in our time inhabit the same mountain range. 

 With regard to the third genus, Antelope, we must certainly, 

 in the present state of our knowledge, consider it a form 

 peculiar to the Old World. I have, however, already alluded 

 to the possibility of a representative of this genus being 

 eventually found also in the Andes. On the other hand, the 

 last of these four genera, Hyasna, leaves us no other re- 

 source than the striking conclusion, that the plains of South 

 America formerly sustained genera of mammals which, at 

 the present time, are confined to the hot zone of the Old 

 World ; and we have seen that this conclusion is still fur- 

 ther corroborated by the two subgenera of Cynailuriis and 

 Speothos; forms that, in the existent creation, are only 

 found in the warm districts of the Old World, but which 

 have left indubitable traces of their presence in the extinct 

 fauna of this continent. 



If we next descend to the lowest step in the subdivisions 

 of the system, that is to species, and compare the extinct 

 with the existing, we are again led to separate them into two 



