GIANT SLOTHS AND ARMADILLOS 287 
the skeleton, that the Megatherium could not have been protected 
as armadillos are by such a shield (see p. 291). 
And now we come to the question how it obtained its food. 
The idea of digging round trees with its claws in order to uproot 
them, must be partly, if not entirely, given up; for Owen has 
proved, by a masterly piece of reasoning, that this cumbrous 
creature, instead of climbing up trees as modern sloths do, 
actually pulled down the tree bodily, or broke it short off above 
the ground by a tour de force, and, in order to do so, sat upon 
its huge haunches and tail as on a tripod, while it grasped the 
trunk in its long powerful arms! Marvellous as this may seem, 
it can be shown that every detail in the skeleton agrees with the 
idea. Of course there would be limits to possibilities in this 
direction, and the larger trees of the period must have been proof 
against such Samson-like attempts on the part of the Mega- 
therium; but when the trunk was too big, doubtless it pulled 
down some of the lower branches. Plate LI. is a restoration, 
by our artist, of the South Kensington skeleton. 
Sir Woodbine Parish thought that the Megatherium fed on the 
Agave, or American aloe. 
Another form of extinct sloth found in the same region is the 
Mylodon. Though of smaller size, it was much bigger than any 
living sloth, and attained a length of eleven feet. It has the 
same general structure, but the head and jaws are somewhat 
different, and more like the recent forms. A nearly perfect and 
original skeleton of Mylodon gracilis has been set up beside its 
huge relative’s cast in the same gallery at the Natural History 
Museum. The crowns of its molar teeth are flat instead of being 
ridged ; hence its name, which signified “ mill-toothed.” 
Yet another was the Scelidotherium! with its long limbs. 
1 Greek—-scelis, limb; therion, beast. 
