SLOTHS, ANT-EATERS AND ARMADILLOS 335 



big as a very large bull, lived at the same time as the megatherium, 

 and, in the light of recent important researches, appears to have 

 survived into quite modern times, for portions of the skin covered 

 with long hair of a light yellowish-brown colour, and actually showing 

 bloodstains and serum, have been discovered. Dr. Nordenskjold 

 found at the end of the fiord of the Ultima Speranza, in Southern 

 Patagonia, a vast cave from which some white settlers living in a 

 farm close by had obtained an enormous piece of the skin of the 

 mylodon, which, though dry, was undecomposed and in perfect 

 preservation. Human bones as well as those of the mylodon have 

 been found in the same cavern, many of the bones of the latter 

 having been unmistakably cut or broken by the human inhabitants 

 of the cave, who it is surmised kept these animals alive in the cave 

 and killed and devoured them, splitting their bones to obtain the 

 marrow. When the last of these gigantic ground sloths, links 

 with the prehistoric past, died it is impossible to say, but that it 

 ceased to exist at a comparatively recent date would appear 

 certain from the evidence that has so far been obtained. 



