MAM 



sub-classes, Placentalia and Impla- 

 centalia ; Placentalia comprising 

 13 orders, namely, Bimana, Quad- 

 rum ana, Carnivora, Artiodactyla, 

 Perissodactyla, Proboscidea, Toxo- 

 dontia, Sirenia, Cetacea, Cheirop- 

 tera, Insectivora, Bruta, Edentata, 

 and Rodentia; and Implacentalia 

 comprising 2 orders, mamely, 

 Marsapialia and Monotremata. 



MAMMA'LIAN. Belonging to the class 

 Mammalia. 



MAMMALI'FEROTJS. (from mammalia 

 and/6T0, to produce, Lat.) A- term 

 applied to strata containing mam- 

 miferous remains. As the mam- 

 maliferom crag of Norfolk, &c. 



MA'MHAKY. Pertaining to the mam- 

 ma?, as the mammary glands, the 

 mammary arteries, &c. 



MA'MMIFEB. (from mamma, a breast, 

 and fero, to bear.) All animals 

 having breasts and suckling their 

 young are included amongst the 

 mammifers. To these Linnaeus 

 assigned the name Mammalia. 

 Cuvier, however, called them 

 Mammifera\ but, as has been ob- 

 served, there appears no good rea- 

 son for altering the original term. 



MA'MMILLAEY. Having small rounded 

 prominences, or projections some- 

 thing resembling teats or nipples ; 

 studded with rounded projections. 



MA'MMILLATED. A term, like the one 

 immediately preceding it, applied 

 to certain minerals, which have 

 the appearance of small bubbles, or 

 rounded protuberances. Flint con- 

 taining calcedony, is generally 

 mammillated. 



In conchology, the apex of a 

 shell when rounded like a teat, is 

 termed mammillated. 



MA'MMOTH. (The etymology of this 

 word does not appear quite agreed 

 on ; some state it to be from a 

 Russian word, mamant ; some, that 

 it is of Tartar origin ; others, that 

 it is derived from Behemoth, an 

 Arabic word, signifying elephant. 

 Mammut, Germ.) The mammoth 



276 ] MAM 



appears to be quite extinct ; from 

 the fossil remains of it which have 

 been discovered, it appears to have 

 had the feet, tusks, trunk, and 

 many other particulars of confor- 

 mation in common with the ele- 

 phant ; but it differed from the 

 elephant in its grinders. Five 

 species have been distinguished. 

 The bones of the mammoth are 

 found in great abundance in Siberia, 

 and not only the bones, but por- 

 tions of the flesh and the skin, and 

 even whole animals have been 

 found in icebergs and in frozen 

 gravel. Towards the close of the 

 last century, the entire carcase of 

 a mammoth was exposed, and at 

 length fell to the ground from a 

 cliff of ice and gravel, on the banks 

 of the river Lena. This animal 

 was nine feet high, and about six- 

 teen feet in length ; the tusks were 

 nine feet long. The skin was 

 covered with hair, and it had a 

 mane upon the neck. 



The mammoth appears to have 

 survived in England when the tem- 

 perature of our latitudes could not 

 have been very different from what 

 it now is ; for remains of this animal 

 have been found in a lacustrine for- 

 mation at North Cliff, in Yorkshire, 

 in which all the land and fresh- 

 water shells can be identified with 

 species now existing in that county. 

 We have no great certainty at what 

 period the mammoth ceased to exist; 

 it is commonly supposed that it be- 

 came extinct previous to the com- 

 mencement of the modern group, 

 but of this there is no good proof. 

 It is supposed, from the prodigious 

 number of bones found in certain 

 places, that the mammoth must 

 have existed in herds of hundreds, 

 or even thousands. According to 

 Pallas, there is scarcely a river, 

 from the Don, or the Tanais, to the 

 extremity of the promontory Tchus- 

 koinosa, in the banks of which the 

 bones of the mammoth are not most 



