ROOM III. 



TROGONTHERIUM. GLYPTODON. 



359 



animal is estimated at twice that of the existing species, viz. 

 five feet. 1 



GLYPTODON. Wall-case G. In the lowermost compart- 

 ment of this case, there are two remarkable relics of colossal 

 edentate animals allied to the Armadillos, to which I would 

 direct the visitor's attention ; but it will be convenient to 

 reserve an account of the geological conditions in which these 

 and similar remains occur, till the skeletons of gigantic ani- 

 mals of this order in Room VI. come under 

 examination. 



I will, therefore, only remark that these 

 fossils are the osseous dermal cases, or sheaths, 

 of the tails of two distinct species of Glyp- 

 todon ; an animal somewhat resembling the 

 Armadillo, being covered with a coat of 

 mail, formed of polygonal osseous plates, 

 united by sutures, that constituted an im- 

 penetrable covering to the body. The plates 

 of this bony investment were not disposed 

 in rings, as in the Armadillos, but were ar- 

 ticulated to each other, and formed a tes- 

 selated cuirass ; the tail was inclosed in a 

 case of this kind, like a sword in its scab- 

 bard. 2 



One of the specimens in the British 

 Museum appears to belong to the species 

 named Glyptodon clavipes ; but the other 

 (see Lign. 75), which is nearly three feet in 

 length, is remarkable for the expanded lobes OF THE TAI J; OF A 



> . *"L SPECIES OF GLTPTO- 



n ear the distal termination of the tail. DON (^ not. size.) 

 These fossils are deserving of particular examination ; they 

 will, I presume, sooner or later, be placed in Room VI. with 

 the other remains of the Edentata of South America. 3 



1 " Boston Journal of Nat. Hist." 1846. 



2 A splendid specimen of the bony cuirass of the Glyptodon is in the 

 Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, in London. 



3 A restored figure of the Glyptodon forms the frontispiece of the 

 highly interesting work on " Buenos Ayres and the Province of Rio de 

 la Plata," by Sir Woodbine Parish, K.C.H. &c. ; the indefatigable explorer, 

 to whom science is indebted for the most important examples of the 

 extinct colossal Edentata hitherto brought to Europe. 



