192 < “ealientes. 
about eighteen inches over the lower jaw, and which has never been de- 
scribed before. 
The position of the tusks in the head, has been a subject of discussion 
among Naturalists, and they have been placed in the same manner as those 
of the Elephant. It gives me pleasure to state, that I can now settle this 
question—for in the head which I discovered, I found a tusk firmly im- 
planted in the socket, and had it conveyed with great care to my museum, 
but owing to the ignorance and carelessness of a laborer, in carrying it 
up stairs, it was broken off, but its position can be proved by a number of 
gentlemen of the highest respectability. The tusks are not situated in 
the same position as those of the Elephant, as was supposed by some. 
They diverge outwards from the head with the convexity forward, and the 
point turning backwards in the same plane with the head ; the tusk found 
in the head measures ten feet one inch, from the base to the tip, following 
the outside of the curvature, and two feet in circumference near the 
socket. The other tusk measures only nine feet—part of the roof 18 
wanting. When placed in the head in their original position, the dis- 
tance from tip to tip, measures sixteen feet. I may add, that it required 
two stout men to carry the largest tusk, and two yoke of oxen to carry the 
head and tusks from the place of disinterment to the museum. 
Besides the mastodon’s head, I have found near the same place, several 
highly interesting remains of antediluvian animals, one of which espe 
cially merits attention. It is the head of a nondescript animal, which 
appears to have been superior in size to the largest elephant, and which 
resembles somewhat the mastodon in the hind part of the head, but ie 
front part is entirely different; and until it is recognized or proved 0 
have been previously discovered, I shall name it Koch's Missourian, in 
honor of the State it is discovered in, and intend, in a very short time “A 
give a minute description of it, as well as of a great many relics not 
herein mentioned. 
A. Kocu, Proprietor of the St. Louis Museum. 
St. Louis Com. Bulletin of June 25, quoted in Phil. Nor. Am. July 11, 1839. 
discovered a new metal. The oxide of cerium, separated from the min 
eral by the usual process, contains nearly two fifths of its weigh 
the oxide of the new metal, merely altered by the presence of the ail 
rium, and which, so to speak, is hidden by it. This consideratio? in 
duced M. Mosander to give the new metal the name of Jatané or 
lantan. é 
It is prepared by calcining the nitrate of cerium, mixed with nitrate 
of latanium. The oxide of cerium loses its solubility in weak acids» 
