HISTORY OF THE ARTIODACTYLA 



385 



and powerful leaper. Another likeness to the cats was in the 

 very long and heavy tail, which was much longer than in the 

 foreodonts, and its vertebrae were hardly distinguishable from 

 those of a Leopard. The limbs were relatively longer than 

 those of the foreodonts and the separate bones had a suggestive 

 likeness to those of carnivores, and, more specifically, of cats. 

 The feet, save in one particular, were not only artiodactyl, 

 but also characteristically foreodont in structure and, as in 

 the earlier members of that family, there were five toes in the 

 manus and four in the pes. The excep- 

 tion was that, instead of narrow and 

 slender hoofs, the feet were armed with 

 sharp, though not very large claws, which 

 were not comparable in relative size to 

 the great claws of the fchalicotheres. 



Altogether, a strange jumble of in- 

 congruous characters was united in this 

 skeleton. Were only the skeleton known 

 without the skull, one would be tempted 

 to call it that of a carnivorous artio- 

 dactyl, but the teeth make such a sugges- 

 tion absurd, since they could have been 

 used only for masticating a diet of soft 

 vegetable substances. No flesh-eater 



has, or ever had, teeth in the remotest degree like these, which 

 were of characteristically herbivorous type. How such a 

 creature lived and what were its habits, are questions to 

 which no satisfactory answer has been found. 



'\Protagriochoerus of the upper Eocene is, unfortunately, 

 known only from very imperfect and fragmentary specimens, 

 which, however, are sufficient to determine some significant 

 points. These remains show that, while the two famihes of 

 the fagriochcerids and the foreodonts were already distinct in 

 the Uinta, they were decidedly nearer together than they 

 became in the Ohgocene. In other words, it is clear that the 



2c 



Fig. 207. — -Right manus 

 of ^Agriochoerus latifrons. 

 White River. (After 

 Wortman.) 



