358 THE BOOK OF THE ANIMAL KINGDOM 



South America remains have been found indicating a beast larger 

 than the modern Lion, possessing fore limbs of great power and 

 armed with large claws, which could be drawn back when not in 

 use, in the same manner as those of a Cat. Remains of this Tiger 

 have also been found in parts of France, Hungary and Italy. It 

 probably glutted itself on the blood of its victims, for the reason 

 suggested in these words written by Mr. Henry R. Knipe — 



" Brutes tusked and tiger-like still wend their way, 

 Seeking by means more sly than brave their prey. 

 And some with little ease can eat their food, 

 So long and thick their ' sabre ' teeth protrude." 



It does not require a great stretch of the imagination to see in this 

 sabre-toothed carnivore the ancestor of the modern Tiger. 



GIANT SLOTH, OR MEGATHERIUM, —Plate XVIII figures the 

 Giant Sloth of Pleistocene times, the remains of which have been 

 found in the alluvial deposits of Paraguay. It has been dignified 

 by the name Megatherium (Greek, megas, great; therion, animal) 

 and fully justifies the appellation. Living Sloths are quite dwarfs 

 in comparison with this monster, which was almost the size of an 

 Elephant. In the Natural History Museum, London, there is a 

 cast of its skeleton, which gives a good idea of what the animal 

 must have been like in a living state. The length is eighteen 

 feet. The hinder parts of the skeleton exhibit a combination of 

 weight and strength ; the bones are bigger than those of an 

 Elephant, the thigh bone being especially massive. To the fore, 

 the skeleton is more slender, but not to the sacrifice of power. The 

 living Sloth, as was pointed out in Chapter XVI, is arboreal in 

 habit ; that is to say it lives in trees, suspending itself by its feet 

 from the branches, and it feeds on fruits, leaves and young herbage. 

 The extinct Megatherium, on the contrary, had no need to climb 

 trees; he was tall enough to reach all the food he required. His 

 was a case of the mountain coming to Mahomet. He took the 

 vantage-point of the ground beneath a tree, making his powerful 

 hind legs and tail a tripod upon which his body rested. The weight 

 of the hinder parts made the upright position easy. Stretching out 

 his fore-legs, or arms, and extending his claws, he firmly grasped 

 the trunk of a tree and bent it downwards so that he could get the 

 leaves ; or mayhap he snapped the trunk and brought the foliage to 

 the ground. He was certainly powerful enough to accomplish 



