SHORT-FOOTED GROUP. 



559 



equally well have been purely terrestrial, and have used its tusks, after the manner 

 of the African elephant, in turning up the soil in search of roots and tubers. 



With this animal, an illustration of whose skull is given below, our present 

 knowledge of the Proboscidians and their ancestors comes to an abrupt termination. 



THE SHORT-FOOTED UNGULATES. 

 SUBORDER Amblypoda. 



There are several extinct groups of Ungulates differing so markedly from the 

 living forms that they cannot be included in any of the groups into which the 

 latter arc divided, and consequently 

 have to be classed in groups by 

 themselves. 



The name of Short -footed 

 Ungulates is applied to one of these 

 groups which is confined to the 

 Eocene division of the Tertiary 

 period, and is more developed in 

 the United States than in Europe. 

 It is represented in both con- 

 tinents by the coryphodons of the 

 lower and middle Eocene beds, and 

 in America by the uintatheres of 

 the upper Eocene. In these animals 

 the feet, as shown in the figure on 

 p. 152, were very short, and were 

 each provided with five toes, the 

 mode of walking being partly 

 plantigrade. The molar teeth were 

 of the type as shown in figure on 

 the next page, having short crowns 

 and the ridges arranged in a 



V-shape in those of the upper jaw. The two bones in the fore-arm, as well as 

 those in the lower leg, were quite distinct from one another. 



The coryphodons were animals which may be compared in size to a bear, and 

 possessed the full typical number of forty-four teeth, with the tusks (canines) well 

 developed. They had no horn-like processes to the skull. In the fore-feet (see 

 p. 152) only the terminal bones of the toes touched the ground, but in the hind 

 ones the whole sole was applied to the ground, in the same manner as in a bear. 



The American uintatheres, on the other hand, were much larger animals, 

 rivalling the Indian rhinoceros in bulk. Their skulls were provided with three 

 pairs of bony processes, which during life were probably covered with horn ; and 

 the upper tusks were developed into enormous sabre-like teeth, protected by a 

 descending flange on each side of the front of the lower jaw. There were no 

 incisor teeth in the upper jaw, and the first premolar tooth was wanting in both jaws, 



SKULL OF DINOTHERE (greatly reduced). 



