PRIMEVAL MAN 231 



eyes to see it. Nor were they the only represen 

 tatives of their family. A much more archaic 

 type of elephant, the mastodon, flourished be 

 side its gigantic cousin. The mastodon was a 

 relatively squat creature, standing certainly 

 four feet shorter than the imperial elephant, 

 with comparatively small and slightly curved 

 tusks and a flatter head. Enormous numbers 

 of mastodons ranged over what is now the 

 United States, and the adjacent parts of Can 

 ada and Mexico. The mastodons represented a 

 stage farther back in the evolutionary line than 

 the true elephants, and in the Old World they 

 died out completely before the latter disap 

 peared even from Europe and Siberia. But in 

 North America, for unknown reasons, they 

 outlasted their more highly developed kinsfolk 

 and rivals, and there is some ground for be 

 lieving that they did not completely disap 

 pear until after the arrival of man on this con 

 tinent. 



The elephant stock developed in the Old 

 World, and it is probable that the true ele 

 phants were geologically recent immigrants to 

 America, coming across the land bridge which 

 then connected Alaska and Siberia. In Cali 

 fornia they encountered the big descendants of 

 other big immigrants, which had reached North 



