714 AFRICAN GAME ANIMALS 



the persistence of ancient types occurred among the genera 

 in past geologic ages. Thus one of the primitive genera, 

 Mastodon, hngered until the last or Pleistocene age in the 

 northern hemisphere, in much of which territory it lived 

 with and supplanted the more highly specialized genus 

 Elephas. The African elephant, which is to-day the giant 

 among the land mammals, was exceeded in height by some 

 of the fossil species, notably by Elephas imperator, from the 

 Pliocene of North America, which attained a height of 13 

 feet or over at the withers. Another form of gigantic size 

 was the Pleistocene species, Elephas meridionalis, of southern 

 Europe, which attained a height of considerably more than 

 12 feet and was, like imperator, one of the allies of the Indian 

 elephant. A gigantic fossil species, antiquus, of the Pliocene 

 of southern Europe, related to the African elephant and 

 likewise a member of the genus Loxodonta, was scarcely less 

 in height than imperator. The African elephant, which at- 

 tains a height of 11 feet or slightly more at the withers, 

 although exceeded in height by these fossil species, can 

 scarcely be said to be a smaller animal in bulk. No fossil 

 elephant is known which had a larger skull. The gigantic 

 species, though taller, were relatively small-skulled forms. 

 The tusks of many of the extinct species were very long and 

 exceeded the average African tusks greatly in this dimension. 

 The great length in the extinct species was often due to 

 their having become of no functional use, so that, in the 

 absence of wear, their points grew to immense length, curving 

 either upward or inward in a large circle and overlapping 

 one another, as in the case of some mammoths. Record 

 tusks of the African elephant approach very closely in thick- 

 ness or diameter to the largest of those of the gigantic fossil 

 species. The disuse to which the tusks were subjected in the 

 mammoths would account for the smaller size of the skull, 

 there being less need for the development of bony crests for 

 muscular attachment for wielding the tusks than in the 

 living African species in which the tusks are subject to 

 much use and wear. At the time these giant species were 

 flourishing there were also pygmy species, some five feet in 

 height, living actually with their larger kin on some of the 

 islands in the Mediterranean, notably Malta and Crete. 

 Such small species were related to the African elephant and 



