160 HISTORY OF THE WOEKS OF CUVIEU. 



entire skeleton. He shows that it is from thesO' bones, especially those of the 

 sliiill, as well as from their teeth, ears, &c., that the two living species, that of 

 Africa and that of India, are distinguished from each other; thus the species of 

 India has the head long, the forehead flat, or even concave, while that of Africa 

 has the head round and forehead convex ; the former has the laminae of its molar 

 teeth in the form of wavy or festooned ribands ; in the latter these lamina? are 

 lozenge-shaped; this last has larger cars and tusks, &c. As to the fossil species 

 or mammoth of Eussia, it is essentially distinguished from the two living species, 

 and in particular from the species of India, to which, however, it is most nearly 

 allied, by its molars, the lamina? of which are closer and straighter, by the alveoli 

 of its tusks, which are longer, by its lower jaw, which is more ol>tnse, &c. ; 

 finall}^, the entire individual, discovered in 1806, on the coast of Siberia, has 

 taught us that it liad two sorts of hair, a reddish, coarse, and tufted wool, and 

 long, black and stiff hairs.* To this it ma}'- be added that the bones of this 

 last species are never found but in a fossil state, and that, on the contrary, the 

 bones of the other two species are never found in that state. The fossil is, there- 

 fore, a lost species. Further, its bones, dispersed through almost all the conn- 

 tries of the world, are always found in the same stn^a as those of the mastodon, 

 the rhinoceros, and the hippopotamus. All these species, then, are of the same 

 epoch, and are all alike extinct. Among them the species which approaches 

 nearest to the elephant is the mastodon ; it was of the same general form, had 

 feet of the same structure, a proboscis, and long tusks ; yet these were essential 

 differences, as well from these tusks being curved in the opposite direction to 

 those of the elephant as from the circumstance that the molar teeth, instead of 

 being formed of transverse laminee, presented a simple corona well furnished 

 with tubercular or mamillated prominences. The mastodon is the largest of 

 fossil animals, yet Daubenton fell into the error of referring a part of its bones 

 to the elephant and another part to the hippopotamus. W. Hunter pointed out 

 that the mastodon differs sensibly from both those animals. Camper showed 

 that it more closely approximated to the first than to the second. Finally, M. 

 Cuvier has completely demonstrated that the mastodon was neither elephant 

 nor hippopotamus, and that, though nearer to the former, it is essentially distin- 

 guished from it by its jaw-teeth ; and that not only as regards species but genus. 

 That genus itself already comprises as many as six species, of which the most 

 celebrated is the great mastodon or animal of the Ohio, which has left its bones 

 only in North America. Another species, long confounded with the latter, has 

 been distinguished from it by M. Cuvier; this was the mastodon tvitli narroio 

 teeth, the bones of which are found in both continents. Of four other species, 

 two pertained to America and two to Europe. The genus of elephants showed 

 us Init one species destroj'ed ; the entire genus of mastodons has perished. 



Tlie genus hippopotamus, which, so far, is known to possess but one living 

 species, numbers already several fossil species. The first or largest, and the only 

 one regarding which some imperfect notions were entertained before M. Cuvier, 

 differed nearly as much from the living species as the fossil elephant from living 

 elepliants. A second, the small fossil hippopotamus, differed much more. The 

 others are as yet little known. The bones of the hippopotamus accompany, in 

 many places, those of elephants and mastodons, but they are much more rare ; 

 the upper Val d'Arno is hitherto the only site where they have been found in any 

 abundance. 



After the genus hippopotamus comes that of the rhinoceros. Here, as with 

 the rest, the osteology and the distinction of living species are always the two 

 points of comparison to which the whole study of fossil bones and species refers 



* The bones which were shown at Paris, towards the comraeucement of the 17th century, 

 as being the bones of King Teutohoclius, and which were the subject of a long controversy 

 between Habicot and Riolau, arc now at the museum. They arc not those of an elephant, as 

 Kiolan thought, but of the mastodon. 



