latehj found in Behrlmfs Straits. 341 



tainty that the largest and most valuable animals, from any 

 peculiarity in the tusks, would naturally be sent as presents 

 from the elephant provinces to the family residences, as the 

 most acceptable; and that the same shaped tusks of these 

 supposed antediluvian elephants have been found at Newnham, 

 near Rugby, in England (the Tripontio of the Romans) * ; and 

 that remains of another elephant were found near Gloucester, 

 mingled with bones and horns of oxen, sheep, and hogs ; and 

 a square stone with them, supposed to have belonged to a 

 sacrificial altar. — (Hakewill's Apology, p. 228.) One was 

 found near the sign of Sir John Oldcastle, in a gravel pit, near 

 which a battle had been fought between the Britons and 

 Romans, and with it the head of a British spear, made of 

 flint. If we add to these facts that, in almost every place in 

 Italy, Spain, and France, where remains of elephants have 

 been dug up, it is known that the Carthaginians and Romans 

 had fought battles in which elephants were slain, the reader 

 who is in search of the truth will not fail to hesitate in his 

 speculations regarding these tusks from Behring's Straits being 

 of antediluvian origin .+ 



♦ Horsley, Brit. Rora., p. 436. 



t The following is another proof of the necessity of caution on this in- 

 teresting subject : — 



" The jaw-bone of an enormous unknown animal has been discovered 

 at Epperheim, in the canton of Arrey, on the left bank of the Rhine, by 

 M. Schleiermacher. Several teeth had previously been found, resembling 

 those which this jaw-bone contains ; but as they were similar to those of 

 the tapir, credit was given to the antediluvian existence of a gigantic 

 species of that animal. This discovery will undeceive naturalists on that 

 point. This animal belongs to a new genus. Supposing that its body 

 was as small in proportion to the head as in the hippopotamus, its entire 

 length must have been nineteen French feet. The largest quadruped hi- 

 therto known was a gigantic sloth, the megalonix, which was twelve feet 

 \0T\gr—Literarij Gazette, Nov. 22, 1828. We are not acquainted with 

 the anatomy of the Om-Kergay, described by Burckhardt ^Quarterly 

 Review, Dec. 1823, p. 521) as quite harmless, and the size of a rhinoceros. 



