MAMMALIA PACHYDERM AT A. 359 



weight. The hgamentum niichae also comes in aid of the 

 muscular power, being here of vast size and strength. 



The head being limited in its range of motion by its approxi- 

 mation to the trunk, the mouth cannot be applied directly to 

 seize the food : and some means were, therefore, to be pro- 

 vided for bringing the food to the mouth. For this purpose, 

 a new organ, the proboscis, has been constructed : it consists 

 of a cylinder, perfectly flexible, and of a length sufficient to 

 reach the ground, when the elephant is standing. The ani- 

 mal has the power of moving it in all possible directions, by 

 means of a prodigious number of muscular fibres, which are 

 collected in small bands, some passing transversely, and ra- 

 diating from the interior towards the circumference, others si- 

 tuated more obliquely, and a third set running longitudinally, 

 and forming an exterior layer : but they are all variously in- 

 terlaced together so as to compose a very complicated ar- 

 rangement. The extremity of the proboscis, w-hich is endowed 

 with great sensibility, is furnished with an appendix, resem- 

 bhng a finger, most of the functions of which, indeed, it is 

 capable of performing. 



For the formation of this admirable member it has not 

 been necessary to deviate from the ordinary laws of deve- 

 lopment by the creation of a new organ; the same end being 

 accomplished by the extension of a structure already be- 

 longing to the type of mammiferous animals. In several of 

 the pachydermata the nostrils are already considerabl}^ ad- 

 vanced, so as to form a moveable snout: this is observable 

 in a certain degree in the Hog; it is still more remarkably 

 seen in the Tapir, which has a snout so lengthened and so 

 moveable as very much to resemble, though on a far smaller 

 scale, the proboscis of the elephant. This latter organ, then, 

 may be considered as merely an elongation of the nostrils, 

 which have been drawn out to suit a special purpose, very 

 different from the function to which that part is usually sub- 

 servient.^ 



♦ A defective development of the bones of the nasal cavity, while the na- 

 tural growth of the soft parts has continued, has often, in the case of thehu- 



