296 



PICTURESQUE SKETCHES 



Fig. 132 



perhaps, brought entirely above the water, was 

 like that of a large elephant, and it was provided 

 with a short, but very muscular and powerful pro- 

 boscis. A pair of large and long tusks were ap- 

 pended to this skull, and curve downwards, as in the 



walrus. But observe 

 the fact most re- 

 markable of all. 

 These tusks do not 

 proceed from the 

 upper jaw, whence 

 they could be made 

 to depend entirely 

 upon the bones of 

 the neck to support 

 them, but are fixed 

 in the lower jaw, 

 and are planted, as 

 it would seem, in 

 this strange position 

 at the greatest pos- 

 sible mechanical disadvantage. There can scarcely 

 be a doubt that an animal provided with appendages 

 so placed was an inhabitant of water ; and the tusks, 

 which are very large, were probably useful as pick- 

 axes, enabling the monster to dig for succulent vege- 

 table food by day, while perhaps at night they could 

 be attached like anchors to the banks of the river or 

 lake in which the animal habitually dwelt. It was 

 the most gigantic of the herbivorous quadrupeds, and 

 was associated with the palseotheres of the more an- 

 cient tertiary period, and with the mastodons and 

 elephants which lived on till a far more recent date. 



DlNOTHERimi. 



(Skull.) 



