Paes 7a POSITION OF D/NOTHERIUM CHAP. 
their small size enabling them to be accommodated in the jaw 
together. The skull of Dinotheriwm is lower than that of Hlephas 
or Mastodon. The bones of the skeleton generally are like those 
of Elephas. 
Though a suggestion of marsupial bones attached to the pelvis 
has been discredited, there is no doubt that Dinothertwm occupies 
the most primitive position among the Proboscidea; but at the 
same time it cannot be regarded as the ancestor of Elephants, as 
it is so much specialised in various ways. ‘The incisors for one 
thing forbid this way of looking at the creature. It is an ancient 
genus found in beds of Miocene age in Europe and Asia. It is 
not known from America. The creature was larger than any 
Elephant. Eighteen feet in length has been assigned to it. The 
enormous weight of the lower jaw and tusks seems to argue that 
it was at least partially aquatig in habit, and that it may have 
used these tusks for grubbing up aquatic roots or for mooring 
itself to the bank. At first there were naturalists who considered 
it as an ally of the Manatee, and the skull is not unsuggestive of 
that of the Sirenia. 
Pyrothervum has been referred to the Proboscidea; but our 
knowledge of that form is limited to a few teeth from Patagonian 
rocks of an uncertain age.’ They are simple bilophodont molars, 
very like those of Dinotherium. A tusk has been found in the 
neighbourhood of these teeth which may possibly belong to the 
same animal; but it is uncertain. 
SUB-ORDER 7. HYRACOIDEA. 
This group of small mammals contains only one well-marked 
genus which is usually named Hyraz, although Procavia seems to 
be the accurate term. Popularly these creatures are known as 
Coneys. They have a singular resemblance to Rodents, the short 
ears and much reduced tail, besides the squatting attitude adopted, 
contributing to this merely skin-deep likeness. They agree with 
other Ungulates in the structure of the molar teeth, which are 
much like those of Rhinoceros; in the absence of a clavicle: in 
the absence of an acromion; in the reduction of the digits of the 
limbs to four digits in the manus and three in the pes. On the 
1 Lydekker, An. Mus. La Plata, Pal. Arg, iii. 1894. 
