GEOLOGY. 329 



Proboscidea from the drift and upper tertiary deposits. The author re- 

 viewed, in a brief but comprehensive manner, the labors of Cuvier, De 

 Blaiuville, Blumenbach, Kaup, Nesti, Owen, and others, pointing out the 

 very wide range which had in the first instance been assigned by Cuvier to 

 the Elephas primigenius, or great Siberian mammoth. The author believed 

 that man}* teeth belonging to other species, and even to other subgeneric 

 forms, had been confounded with those of Elephas primigenius, and 

 owing to such erroneous and improper determination, nearly one half of the 

 whole world had been yielded as the habitat of this peculiar elephant; 

 whereas he hoped to show that these teeth belonged to distinct species, and, 

 in some cases, even to distinct sub-genera of the Proboscidea. Most of the 

 subsequent writers had followed Cuvier in his erroneous determinations on 

 this subject. The author referred to a valuable synopsis which he had pre- 

 pared, and which was suspended in the room, showing that the Pro- 

 boscideans, or mammals with prehensile trunks, were divisible into three 

 great genera, namely, the dinotherium, the mastodon, and the elephant. 



The genus Dinotherium contained two species. The mastodon was divisi- 

 ble into three sub-genera, namely, the trilophodon, containing seven spe- 

 cies ; the tetralophodon, containing six species ; and the pentelophodon, of 

 one species. The genus Elephas he has divided also into three sub-genera, 

 namely, the stegodon, containing four species; the loxodon, four species; 

 and the enelephas, or elephants proper, containing six species. 



All the preceding genera and sub-genera are now extinct, except two 

 species of enelephas, namely, the Asiatic or Indian elephant, and the 

 African elephant. 



The Dinotherium is an extinct genus of the Proboscidea, established by 

 Professor Kaup from remains which were abundantly met with at Eppel- 

 sheim, in Hesse Darmstadt, in beds which the continental geologists con- 

 sider equivalent of the mioscene of Lyell. The restoration, by Professor 

 Kaup, of the Dinotherium giganteum, represents an enormous amphibious 

 animal, with a head nearly four feet in length, extreme length of body 

 about eighteen feet, head furnished with a long oblique proboscis, and with 

 two remarkable incurved tusks like those of the walrus, and the general 

 form resembling that of a gigantic tapir. 



The mastodon is distinguished from the elephant by the structure of the 

 molar teeth. The ridges of dentine, surrounded by enamel, which pass 

 transversely across the tooth, are further apart, are more wavy in their 

 outline, and in young specimens are broken into little isolated conical eleva- 

 tions. When these wear down, the hard ridges, or ridge-plates as Dr. Fal- 

 coner terms them, resemble more the lozenge shapes on the teeth of the 

 African elephant than the elongated narrow laminae of Elephas indicus. 



The sub-genera of mastodon had been named from the number of trans- 

 verse crests or ridges on the teeth (lophodon, tooth-crested, from Ao^os, 

 crest, OSous, tooth); hence trilophodon, teeth three-crested; tetralophodon, 

 teeth four-crested; pentelophodon, teeth five-crested, etc. 



Pictet and other palaeontologists have long complained of the way in 

 which the remains of mastodon have been confounded with Elephas. The 

 genus mastodon appears to have had a wide range, although no remains 

 have yet been met with in Britain except in the marine crag of Norfolk, 

 from which Mr. Morris quotes M. angustidens. The remains of the mas- 

 todon are abundant near Eppclsheim; they have also been found in the en- 

 virons of Zurich, in Auvergne, in Bavaria, and Saxony. Species of masto- 



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