228 THE MAMMALIA. 



structure of the feet of animals, account for the 

 fact that the trunked-aninials have always been 

 classed with the genuine hoofed animals ; but any 

 attempt at a closer definition of the older system, 

 with its many-hoofed animals and thick-skinned 

 animals, always led to the isolation of the ele- 

 phants. Their dentition shows no link whatever 

 with those of the present animals. And in causal 

 connection with the dentition we have the strange 

 shape of the skull, and again connected with the 

 latter the development of the proboscis, which in a 

 wonderful manner counterbalances the weight and 

 awkwardness of the head and neck. Probosces are 

 met with in other mammals : thus we have the 

 lip-finger of the rhinoceroses and the prominent 

 lip and nose of the tapirs and of the saiga-antelope. 

 Moreover, our excellent anatomist Burmeister 

 (whether rightly or wrongly I do not venture to 

 say) has equipped the Macrauchenia, probably one 

 of the horse family from the Pliocene deposits of 

 Patagonia, with an appendage resembling an ele- 

 phant's trunk (Fig. 39). 



Be that as it may, at all events our present Ele- 

 phant is one of the strangest and most enigmatical 

 forms, which, moreover, must have impressed 

 uncivilised nations in an extraordinary manner. 



