130 On Mastodontoid and Megatherioid Animals. 



their country which they were incapable of extracting, their 

 sole appeal to the Russian miners was, *' Take from us our 

 gold, but for God's sake leave us our ancestors." 



Overcoming, however, all difficulties, M. Koch succeeded in 

 extracting, and afterwards in setting up, the most complete 

 specimen of the species which has ever been seen. Applying 

 to it the provisional name of " Missourium,'' he exhibited it 

 'for some time in the United States, and then brought it with 

 many of the associated bones to London, in the hopes of 

 having the remains perfectly described, and of obtaining for 

 them a price worthy of the British nation. 



The arrival of such a collection could not fail to excite the 

 most lively interest and curiosity among our naturalists, and 

 the bones having been attentively examined by many members 

 of this Society, produced a diversity of opinion respecting the 

 generic character of the chief remains. North America had 

 long been a fertile mine of such reliquiae, and the naturalists 

 of the United States had not been backward in studying and 

 describing them. It is not, therefore, a little remarkable 

 that the same difference of opinion as to the generic and spe- 

 cific identity of the animals that prevailed across the Atlantic, 

 is presented in the memoirs which have recently been read 

 before us ; Dr Harlan and Mr Cooper having maintained opi- 

 nions, with which, to a great extent, Professor Owen concurs, 

 whilst Dr Grant and M. Koch have supported the views of the 

 late Dr Godman. 



Citing the American authorities on his side of the question, 

 including Dr Hayes, and enumerating no less than thirteen 

 species of Mastodon and six species of Tetracaulodon, Dr 

 Grant has made a vigorous effort to vindicate the true generic 

 characters of the Tetracaulodon, as founded on the presence 

 of a tusk or tusks in the lower jaw and certain variations in 

 the form of the crowns of the molar teeth. 



This view has been sustained by Mr A. Nasmyth in an 

 elaborate paper " On the Minute Structure of the tusks of 

 extinct Mastodontoid animals.'' Microscopical examination of 

 portions of the tusks believed to belong to five distinct species, 

 viz. Mastodon giganteus^ Tetracaulodon Godmani^ T. Kochiit 



