617 



ELEPHANT. 



ELEPHANT. 



618 



fibre of trees ia thereby rendered independent of the seasons which 

 regulate the development of leaves and fruit ; the forest-food of such 

 a species becomes as perennial as the lichens that flourish beneath 

 the winter snows of Lapland ; and were such a quadruped to be 

 clothed, like the Rein-Deer, with a natural garment capable of resisting 

 the rigours of an arctic winter, its adaptation would be complete. 

 Had our knowledge of the Mammoth indeed been restricted, as in the 

 case of almost all other extinct animals, to its bones and teeth, it 

 would have been deemed a hazardous speculation to have conceived, 

 a priori, that the extinct ancient elephant, whose remains were so 

 abundant in the frozen soil of Siberia, had been clad, like most 

 existing quadrupeds adapted for such a climate, with a double gar- 

 ment of close fur and coarse hair ; seeing that both the existing 

 species of elephants are almost naked, or at best scantily provided 

 when young with scattered coarse hairs of one kind only. 



" The wonderful and unlooked-for discovery of an entire Mammoth, 

 demonstrating the arctic character of its natural clothing, has how- 

 ever confirmed the deductions which might have been legitimately 

 founded upon the localities of its most abundant remains, as well as 

 upon the structure of its teeth, namely, that, like the Rein-Deer and 

 Musk-Ox of the present day, it was capable of existing in high 

 northern latitudes." 



The kind of food partaken of by these creatures in their northern 

 habitations did not probably differ much from that which they obtain 

 at the present day in tropical climates. Their peculiar teeth enable 

 them to derive a great proportion of their food from the woody fibre 

 of the branches of trees, and in this respect the structure of the teeth 

 of the extinct species was analogous to that of the recent ones. 

 Foreata of hardy trees and shrubs still grow upon the frozen soil of 

 Siberia, and it is not unreasonable to suppose that at the time the 

 Mammoth existed in the north of Europe it possessed an arboreal 

 vegetation amply sufficient to supply the necessities of this animal, 

 even in districts where the ground was covered during the greater 

 period of the year with snow. 



"We may therefore safely infer," gays Professor Owen, "from 

 physiological grounds, that the Mammoth would have found the 

 requisite means of subsistence at the present day, and at all seasons, 

 in the sixtieth parallel of latitude ; and relying on the body of evidence 

 adduced by Mr. Lyell, in proof of increased severity in the climate 

 of the northern hemisphere, we may assume that the Mammoth 

 habitually frequented still higher latitudes at the period of its actual 

 existence. . . It has been suggested," observes the same philo- 

 sophical writer, " that, as in our own times, the northern animals 

 migrate, so the Siberian Elephant and Rhinoceros may have wandered 

 towards the north in summer. 



"In making such excursions during the heat of that brief season the 

 Mammoths would be arrested in their northern progress by a condition 

 to which the Rein-Deer and Musk-Ox are not subject, namely, the 

 limits of arboreal vegetation, which however, as represented by the 

 dominating shrubs of polar lands, would allow them to reach the 

 70th degree of latitude. But with this limitation, if the physiological 

 inferences regarding the food of the Mammoth from the structure of 

 its teeth be adequately appreciated and connected with those which 

 may be legitimately deduced from the ascertained nature of its inte- 

 gument, the necessity of recurring to the forces of mighty rivers, 

 hurrying along a carcass through a devious course, extending through 

 an entire degree of latitude, in order to account for its ultimate en- 

 tombment in ice, whilst so little decomposed as to have retained the 

 cuticle and hair, will disappear. And it can no longer be regarded 

 as impossible for herds of Mammoths to have obtained subsistence in 

 a country like the southern part of Siberia where trees abound, not- 

 withstanding it is covered during a great part of the year with snow, 

 seeing that the leafless trees during even a long and severe Siberian 

 winter would not necessarily unfit their branches for yielding food tq 

 the well-clothed Mammoth. With regard to the extension of the 

 geographical range of the Elephas primiyeniui into temperate latitudes, 

 the distribution of its fossil remains teaches that it reached the 40th 

 degree north of the equator. 



" History in like manner records that the Rein-Deer had formerly a 

 more extensive distribution in the temperate latitudes of Europe than 

 it now enjoys. The hairy covering of the Mammoth concurs however 

 with the localities of its most abundant remains, in showing that, 

 like the Rein-Deer, the northern extreme of the temperate zone was 

 its metropolis. 



" Attempts have been made to account for the extinction of the race 

 of northern elephants by alterations in the climate of their hemi- 

 sphere, or by violent geological catastrophes, and the like extraneous 

 'al causes. When we seek to apply the same hypotheses to 

 explain the apparently contemporaneous extinction of the gigantic 

 leaf-eating Mrgatkrria of South America, the geological phenomena of 

 that continent appear to negative the occurrence of such destructive 

 changes. Our comparatively brief experience of the progress and 

 duration of species within the historical period is surely insufficient 

 Vi justify, in every case of extinction, the verdict of violent death. 

 With regard to many of the larger Mammalia, especially those which 

 have passed away from the American and Australian continents, the 

 absence of sufficient signs of extrinsic extirpating change or convul- 

 sion, makes it almost as reasonable to speculate with Brocchi on the 



possibility that species, like individuals, may have had the cause of 

 their death inherent in their original constitution, independently of 

 changes in the external world, and that the term of their existence, 

 or the period of exhaustion of the prolific force, may have been 

 ordained from the commencement of each species." 



Associated with the Elephas primiyenius in the Tertiary Beds of 

 England are the remains of another gigantic Proboscidean Animal 

 belonging to the genus Mastodon. This genus possesses two enormous 

 tusks projecting from the upper jaw, and was provided with a por- 

 boscis, as may be inferred from the length of the tusks, which would 

 have prevented the mouth from reaching the ground. Like the 

 Elephants they were destitute of canine teeth, and provided with a 

 small number of large and complex molar teeth, successively deve- 

 loped from before backwards. The broad crowns of the molar teeth 

 were also cleft by transverse fissures, but these clefts were fewer in 

 number, of less depth, and greater width, than in the Elephants : the 

 transverse ridges were more or less deeply bisected, and the divisions 

 more or less produced in the form of udder-shaped cones, whence the 

 name Mastodon (fj.airros, and 88os), assigned by Cuvier to this genus 

 of Proboscidean Mammalia. Two other dental characters pointed 

 out by Professor Owen distinguish the genus Mastodon from the 

 genus Elephas. The first is the presence of two tusks in the lower 

 jaw of both sexes in the Mastodon. These are retained in the male 

 but shed in the female. The second character is the displacement of 

 the first and second molars in the vertical direction by a tooth of 

 simpler form than the second. 



One species of Mastodon has been found in England, the M. angusli- 

 dens of Owen, the Mastodon a Dents Etroites of Cuvier. Remains 

 of it occur in the formation called by Sir Charles Lyell the Fluvio- 

 marine Crag. It belongs to the Older Pliocene division of the 

 Tertiary System. 



A species of Mastodon larger than the M. angustidens of Europe has 

 been found fossil in many parts of the United States. This is the 

 M. giganteue. A specimen of the animal nearly perfect was obtained 

 in the state of Missouri in 1840. It was exhibited at the Egyptian 

 Hall, Piccadilly, London, in 1842 and 1843, under the name of the 

 ' Missouri Leviathan.' It was strangely distorted ; but having been 

 purchased by the Trustees of the British Museum it has been made 

 tossume its correct proportions, and is now one of the chief objects 

 of attraction in that national collection. The following are the pro- 

 portions of this gigantic skeleton : Extreme length, 20 feet 2 inches; 

 height, 9 feet 6j inches: cranium, length, 34 feet; vertical dimen- 

 sions, 4 feet ; width, 2 feet 11 inches ; width of pelvis, 5 feet 8 inches : 

 tusks, extreme length, 7 feet 2 inches ; projection of the same, 5 feet 

 2 inches ; circumference at the base, 27 inches. It was found near 

 the banks of the river La Pomme de Terre, a tributary of the Osage 

 River, in Burton county, Missouri. The bones were imbedded in a 

 brown sandy deposit full of vegetable matter, with recognisable 

 remains of the cypress, tropical cane, swamp-moss, stems of the pal- 

 metto, 4c., and this was covered by beds of blue-clay and gravel to a 

 thickness of about fifteen feet. Mr. Koch, the discoverer, states that 

 an Indian flint arrow-head was found beneath the leg-bones of this 

 skeleton, and four similar weapons were imbedded in the same 

 stratum. This indicates that the formation was more recent thnu 

 that in which the remains of the British Mastodon had been found. 

 Other remains of this Mastodon have been found in America, espe- 

 cially in the Big Bone Lick, in Kentucky, where it is said the remains 

 of not less than 100 mastodons, 20 mammoths, with bones of the 

 megalonyx, stag, horse, and bison, have been discovered. 



Amongst the remarkable remains brought from the Sewalik Hills, 

 in Hindustan, by Captain Cautley and Dr. Falconer are the remains 

 of several species of the genus Elephas and other proboscidean 

 animals. Dr. Falconer, speaking of the group of animals thus 

 revealed by his researches, says : 



" This fossil Fauna is composed of representative types of Mam- 

 malia of all geological ages, from the oldest of the tertiary periods 

 down to the most modern ; and of all the geographical divisions of 

 the old continent, grouped together into one comprehensive assem- 

 blage. Among the forms contained in it there are of the 

 Pachydermala several species of Mastodon, Elephant, Hippopotamus, 

 Rhinoceros, Anoplolherium, and three species of Equws; of the Rumi- 

 nant ia the colossal genus Sivatherium, which is peculiar to India, with 

 species of Camelus, Boi, Cervus, and Antilope; of the Camivora, 

 species of most of the great types, together with several undescribed 

 genera ; of the Rodentia and Quadrumana several species ; of the 

 Jti/,iitia, n gigantic tortoise (Colaaochelys), with species of Emys and 

 Trionyx, and several forms of Gavials and Crocodiles. To these may 

 be added the remains of Struthious and other birds, and Fishes, 

 Crustacea, and Mollusca." 



The genus Elephas in this collection which has been deposited in 

 the British Museum includes six species. 



. planifrona, distinguished by the flatness of the forehead and the 

 intermediate character of its molar teeth. 



E. Namadicus, with a great development of the cranium, and teeth 

 closely allied to those of the Indian species. 



K. Jfymdricits, with a turban-like vortex of the skull and teeth, 

 whose structure approaches that of the African Elephant. 



E. Gancsa is the most remarkable of the Sewalik species. A skull 



