332 BRANCH CHORDATA 



Fossil remains of another extinct form, the Maslotlon, are constantly being 

 found in the gravel pits of Europe, Asia, and North America. Some species 

 have tusks in both jaws and tuberculated niohirs lik(; the pig. 



The remainder of this order is included in the two great divis- 

 ions of Perissodac'tijla (odd toed) and Artiodac' tijla (even toed). 



Perissodactyla. — The odd-toed group has the molars and 

 premolars of the same size and the mitldle toe preflominantly 

 developed. " The other toes in the three hving families are 

 reduced to cUfferent degrees." 



The tapirs ( Tapir'idce) are among the oldest mammals represented to-day, 

 the family being as old as that of Equidoe, though the specialization of the 

 toes has never advanced so far. The fore feet are four toed, and the hind 

 feet three toed. The nose and the upper lip are lengthened into a short 

 proboscis. 



An American species (Tnp'irus terrestris) is a solitary, dull and gloomy, 

 timid and defenseless animal, hiding away near the stream, in the marshy, 

 tropical woods in the daytime, and feeding at night. \\'hen alarmed or 

 pursued it always takes to the water for safety. The jaguar is its most 

 formidable enemy. 



The Malayan forms haunt the most retired spots among the woofled 

 hills, thus escaping its enemy, the tiger. 



The tapirs (genus Tap'irus) are now found only in South and Central 

 America, the Malay Peninsula, Java, and Sumatra. They are small or 

 moderate sized, ungainly creatures, covered with brownish-black hair. 

 The young is spotted and striped with white, as is the rule among quad- 

 rupeds of the forest.^ The tapir's quick senses enable it to slip away, 

 which it can do with great rapidity, when disturbed. When at rest in the 

 daytime a Malayan form " exactly resembles a grayish boulder, and as it 

 often lives near the rocky streams of the hill jungles, it is not easily de- 

 tected." Tapirs are browsers, seizing and drawing t lie succulent leaves and 

 shoots into the mouth with the proboscis. " They are extremely fond of the 

 leaves of the low-growing cocoa plant, and they often in one night destroy 

 a cocoa field which has cost a poor Indian the hard labor of a year." 



South American tapirs are said to make interesting pets. They are 

 kept in the National Zoological Park at Washington. In Costa Rica the 

 tapir is much hunted, for its flesh is good, both fresh and salted, and its 

 thick hide is made into twisted whips (rawhides). 



The primitive forms were distributed all over the world, " but as the later 

 tertiary conditions changed from torrid to temperate outside the tropics, 

 they became extinct everywhere save in the hot, moist climate under the 

 equator, wliere tlie> have continued to the present time." Although now 

 8tructurall>- very different from the horse of to-day, they probably repre- 

 sent something of th(^ character of the ancestral horse. 



The rhinoceros (Rhinorcrot'idw) is a relic of nature's early attempts to 

 formulate the solid-hoofed type of quadruped. It is recognized in fossils 

 toward the close of the Eocene in both Europe and North America, and the 



I Ingersoll, p. 372. 



