338 PALEONTOLOGY 



the second 4to edition of the Ossemens Fossiles (torn, iii., pp. 

 69 and 251, 1822), to that of Anoplotherium gracile. 



The distinction indicated by Cuvier is now accepted by 

 palaeontologists as a generic one, and a second species (Xipho- 

 don Geylenszs) has been added by M. Gervais {Paleontograph ic 

 Frangaise, 4to, 1845, p. 90) to the type-species, Xiphodon 

 gracilis, of which he figures an instructive portion of the den- 

 tal series of both jaws, obtained from the lignites of Debruge 

 near Apt. The dental formula of Xiphodon is the typical 



• 3—3 1—1 4—4 3—3 A . 



one, viz.— 1 3 - 3 , c^ v p^, m 3=3 =44. 



The teeth are arranged in a continuous series in both jaws. 

 The canines and first three premolars have the crowns more 

 extended antero-posteriorly, lower, thinner, transversely, and 

 more trenchant, than in the type Anoplotheria (whence the 

 name Xiphodon, or sword-tooth). The feet are didactyle, with 

 metacarpals and metatarsals distinct. The tail is short. The 

 lower true molars have two pairs of crescentic lobes with the 

 convexity turned outwards. It was nearly allied to Dichodon. 



Genus Microtherium. — Entire crania of Microthcrium,from 

 the lacustrine calcareous marls of the Puy-de-D6me, are in the 

 British Museum, and these show that the hinder division of 

 the upper true molars was complicated by the additional 

 (third) cusp. 



With regard to Microtherium, the unusually perfect fossil 

 skulls of that small Herbivore, which did not exceed in size 

 the delicate chevrotains of Java and other Indo-Archipelagic 

 islands — e.g. Tragulus kanchil — are of importance in regard 

 to the tpiestion of their alleged affinity to the Ruminantia, on 

 account of the demonstration they give of the persistent and 

 functional upper incisor teeth. The little eocene even-toed 

 Herbivores, like the larger Anoplotherioids, thus departed from 

 the characters of the true Euminants of the present day, in 

 the same degree in which they adhered to the more general 

 type of the artiodactyles. Had M. de Blainville, who believed 



