220 



To the River Hate and Baek 



Fig 22. Dried ordure of Grypotherium 

 do me stic um Roth. Specimens in Carnegie 

 Museum, i nat. size. 



stack of ha}' which had been employed as fodder. He 

 found more pieces of the strange skin and numerous 

 bones. The skulls of the specimens, which he and 

 others before him had found, showed that the animals 

 had been killed by knocking them on the head by a 

 weapon, possibly a stone ax. He found various arte- 

 facts representing a primitive race of men. Dr. 

 Santiago Roth described the material brought back 



by Hauthal and 

 others, and gave 

 the animal the 

 name of Grypothe- 

 rium domesticum , 

 holding that the 

 specific name lis- 

 tai, applied by 

 Ameghino, related 

 not to the remains 



discovered at Last Hope Inlet, but to an imagi- 

 nary creature. It was pointed out by several 

 critics, among them Professor J. B. Hatcher, that in 

 truth the type of Ameghino's Neomylodon listai, if 

 type it could be called, was a lot of hearsay, a rumor, a 

 tale told by an Indian. Florentine Ameghino had in 

 fact heard in some way a report of the finding of the 

 skin at Last Hope Inlet. The story had passed from 

 mouth to mouth, though nothing had as yet been 

 printed about the matter. A few of the bonelets had 

 also probably been passed from hand to hand as 

 "curios.' They had fallen apparently into the pos- 

 session of Carlos Ameghino, who sent them to his 

 brother. Without any more definite knowledge than 

 he had thus acquired Ameghino rushed into print with 

 his new generic and specific names. There are men who 



