72 NOTES AND 



events, expelled from any known region in our country? this becomes a ques- 

 tion still more interesting if we suppose the animals to have been carnivorous. 

 That they were so, as well as graminivorous, is pretty well authenticated, by 

 the formation of their grinders. Perhaps, to say they were omnivorous, would 

 not be hazardi-12, too iime'i. Indeed, my worthy and learned friend, dr Jame? 

 G. Graham, who examined the fossils, went still further ; for the formation of 

 the bones, near, and belonging to the foot, warranted him, as a professional 

 man, in the belief that this animal had claws. 



I am aware, that an opinion so singular as this entertained T>y my learned 

 friend, dr. Graham, forms an anomaly in nature ; but from a careful examina- 

 tion of the bones of the foot, the metatarsal bones (as they are termed in anat- 

 omy) were so constituted that the doctor drew his conclusions of their apper- 

 taining to a clanfooted race of beasts. Nor is this opinion more strange than 

 their actual existence. For, whether they are of a genus of animals now un- 

 known, whether of the elephantine family, of the asiatic or Siberian species ; 

 the solution of their existence, upon any certain knowledge, is equally difficult 

 and inexplicable. 



From this narrative, you will be enabled to possess yourself of some infonna 

 lion on an interesting subject, which could not be w. ell or accurately obtained, 

 except by viewing the topography of the country, and witnessing the taking out 

 of the skeletons ; this not being practicable for you in your various literary 

 and official pursuits, I have thought a circumstantial narrative worthy of your 

 enlightened consideration. 



Tins subject has been a source of conversation and inquiry amongst men of 

 information and has led to different speculative opinions. My friend, the eru- 

 dite dr. Mitchill, appears to have struck upon a philosophical explanation, which 

 is at c.noe bold, and will explain the phenomena. By his refleetioas he places 

 these curiosities amongst elephantine relics ; occasioned by the change of the 

 axis of the globe ninety degrees, at some very remote period. By this hypothesis 

 may be also explained the existence of these bones and bodies of animal?, belong- 

 ing to low and warm latitudes, being found in the cold and frozen climates of 

 the earth. That gentleman supposes the ancient equator to have extended, in 

 the northern hemisphere, from the bay of Bengal, near where the mouth of the 

 Ganges are through Thibet, Tartary, and Siberia, to the present North Polo, 

 and thenre along in North America through the tracts west of Hudson's Bay 

 and Lake Superior, to the sources of the Mississippi, and thence down to the 

 Gulf of Mexico, near its places of disemboguement, and so onward across New 

 Spain to the South Sea. That such was probably the old equatorial line. 



In corroboration of this gentleman's opinion, he truly alleges, that under the 

 ancient equator have been found the remains of animals peculiar to warra'i-li- 



