THE " PANGOLIN GIGANTESQUE" 2 1 I 



Sub-Ordek 3. ANCYLOrODA. 



The history of the discovery of the members of this order 

 is very instructive as illustrating the dangers of laying too much 

 classificatory importance upon detached fragments of animals. 80 

 long ago as 1825 terminal phalanges of a new creature were found 

 in the Miocene of Eppelsheim, and sent to Cuvier. Cuvier named 

 them " Pangolin gigantesque," deeming them, on account of their 

 general form and cleft terminations, to pertain to the Edentata. 

 In tlie same bed some seven years later were found certain teeth 

 clearly of an Ungulate character, to which the generic name of 

 Chalicotherium was applied. It was subsequently discovered 

 that the teeth and the claws belonged to the same animal, and, 

 later, further remains turned up which disclosed a creature 

 having the anomalous composition of an Ungulate with decisively 

 Ungulate teeth, Ijut with the feet to a laro;e extent like those of 

 an unguiculate animal. The same confusion of characters occurs 

 also, it will be remembered, in the distinctly Artiodactyle 

 Agriochoerus (see p. 331). Indeed the feet of the latter when 

 first discovered were erroneously, as it now appears, referred to 

 the present order of Ungulates under the name of Artio7iyx. 

 It is probable that the genus Moropus of North America is a 

 member of this group, and that it is probably congeneric with a 

 somewhat different type of Ancylopod known as Macrotherium. 

 It is also clear that Anisodon, ScMzotl cerium, and Ancylotheriurn , 

 if not congeneric with either of the two recognised genera, are 

 at least very close to them. 



Chalicotherium has a skull which recalls that of some of the 

 earlier Ungulates ; it has, however, no incisors at all, and no 

 canines in the upper jaw ; this feature has led to the belief that 

 the animal is related to the Edentata, and that it is in fact a link 

 between them and the Ungulata. The molars, like those of the 

 Perissodactyla, are of the buno-selenodont type. It also agrees 

 with that group (to which it has been approximated by several 

 writers) in the tridactyl manus and pes, and in the characters 

 of the tarsus. But although tridactyl, the axis of the limb 

 passes through the fourth digit. Chalicotheriuin is not mes- 

 axonic, as are the Perissodactyles. Moreover, it has no third 



