364 Memoir upon living and fossil Elephants. 



of them, last much longer than the first. The substitutions 

 therefore take place at intervals longer and longer as the 

 elephant advances in age. 



The teeth of elephants, like those of all other ani- 

 mals, only push out their roots when the body is perfect ; 

 the roots are formed in layers like the rest of the tooth : it 

 could not well be otherwise. But wliv ihis division in 

 another sense, w'.en th^- junction of the caps of all ihe 

 gelatinous eminences seems to produce notqii^g else than a 

 single body ? 



In order to answer this question, which is of a general 

 interest to all kinds of teeth, we must add a circuuistance 

 to the description T have given of the genus : I have reserved 

 this point until the present occasion, that I niiglit not loo 

 much confuse the idens of my readers. 



The base of this gelatinous boilv, whose producfions, 

 which I have called iculh, serve as nuclei ti) the ianiince of 

 the tooth, does not adiicre at all its points to the hotiom of 

 the capsule. There are. from space to sp'^ce, interruptions 

 of the continuity, and consequently the adherent j)arts of 

 this base may be considered as very short pedicles. When 

 the laminte of osseous substance cover all the produc- 

 tions or wa'ls, and all the body of the nucleus of the 

 tooth, it ir- continued always upon and between the pedi- 

 cles : the particles of this laniina which proceed between the 

 pedicles form the under part of the body of liie tooth; the 

 particles v.hich envelop the pedicles, and which are conse- 

 quently more or less tubulous, form the tiist commence- 

 ments of the roots. 



These roots, and the pedicles which serve them ns a nu- 

 cleu-i, are aftcrwarvls lengthened, for two reasons : at first, 

 the progress of the lan)inas of osseous substance, v.'hich, by 

 always shooting, force the tooth to riic and lenve the alvco- 

 h.iS3 afterwards, the thickening of the body of the (ooih by 

 the foruiation of the successive laver^., v. hich,.bv l-iHing the 

 interior vacuum, hardly leaves anv m.ire room for t'le ge- 

 latinous nucleus, alid puilies it towards the interior vS the 

 tubes of the roots. 



There is no enamel v.or ccrtica; produced upon the roots, 



because. 



