216 GLACIAL HISTORY. 



more abundant. It was rather larger than the Indian elephant, 

 to which it is more nearly related than to the African. Its 

 tusks were from 8 to 15 feet long, and more strongly curved 

 than those of the Indian elephant ; and the molars have more 

 numerous and narrower transverse plates with parallel margins, 

 by which they are also distinguished from those of Elephas an- 

 tiquus (compare figs. 350 & 351). If we imagine a very large 

 Indian elephant, clothe it with long blackish-brown hairs form- 

 ing a mane on the neck, give it large ears fringed with hairs, 

 long strongly curved tusks, and thick massive legs, we obtain a 

 picture of this remarkable animal. It has been found in many 

 Swiss localities ; but it is unfortunately difficult to say at what 

 period in the Quaternary epoch it first made its appearance in 

 Switzerland. Its remains are generally discovered in gravel- 

 pits ; but as masses of sand and pebbles were deposited during 

 the whole of the Quaternary period, we cannot in most cases 

 decide to what section of that period they are to be referred. 

 In the beds of rolled pebbles which immediately cover the lig- 

 nites at Durnten, Wetzikon, and Utznach (see section, p. 150, 

 fig. 328, c- g, and p. 152) no remains of animals have as yet 

 been found; but they occur in the gravel- pit of Irgenhausen, 

 near Wetzikon, which very probably belongs to the same divi- 

 sion. Here M. Messikomer discovered large bones no doubt 

 belonging to an elephant ; but it is still doubtful whether this 

 was the mammoth or the Elephas antiquus. Undoubted molars 

 of the mammoth, however, have been found in the gravel-pit of 

 the Holzerweid (near Bussenhausen, above Pfaffikon) and in 

 those of Huntwangen and Maschwanden, as also in those of the 

 Cantons of Berne, Basle, and Neuchatel, and near Merges. 

 Near Neuchatel a tooth was found in stratified gravel, resting 

 upon polished rocks. But this smoothing of the rocks, was 

 probably effected during the first Glacial period, as it was 

 only at that time that the great Rhone glacier reached so far ; 

 hence this fact only proves that the mammoth came into the 

 . Neuchatel district after the first Glacial period. The locality 

 near Merges is more important. Here, in a section formed by 

 the Boiron rivulet, half a mile west of the town, a fine molar 

 and a tusk were found lying at a depth of about 12 feet in strati- 

 fied gravel. The gravel belongs to a terrace situated about 



