PACHYDERMATA. 107 



the foot, that their only external appearance is in the nails attached 

 to the edge of this species of hoof. They have no canini or incisors 

 properly so called, but in their incisive bone are implanted two 

 tusks, which project from the mouth, and frequently attain to an 

 enormous size. The magnitude requisite for the alveoli of these 

 tusks renders the upper jaw so high, and so shortens the bones of 

 the nose, that the nostrils in the skeleton are placed near the top of 

 the face; but in the living animal they are continued out into a cylin- 

 drical trunk or proboscis, composed of several thousands of small 

 muscles, variously interlaced, extremely flexible, endowed with the 

 most exquisite sensibility, and terminated by an appendage resem- 

 bling a finger. This proboscis is to the Elephant what the hand is 

 to the Monkey. 



But one living genus of the Proboscidiana is known, that of 



ELEPHAS, Lin. 



Or the Elephant, which comprehends the largest of the terrestrial Mammalia. 

 Their food is strictly vegetable. 



The Elephants of the present day, clothed with a rough skin nearly des- 

 titute of hair, are only found in the torrid zone of the eastern continent, 

 where hitherto only two species have been ascertained. 



E. indicus, Cuv. (The Elephant of India.) An oblong head; the crown 

 of the grinders presenting transverse undulating fillets, which are sections 

 of the laminae which compose them worn by trituration. This species has 

 rather smaller ears than the next one, and has four nails to the hind foot. It 

 is found from the Indus to the Eastern ocean, and in the large islands in the 

 south of India. They have been used from the earliest ages as beasts of 

 draught and burden. The females have very short tusks, and hi this respect 

 many of the males resemble them. 



E. africanusy Cuv. (The African Elephant.) A round head; convex 

 forehead; large ears; the crowns of the grinders divided into lozenges. 

 Found from Senegal to the Cape of Good Hope. The tusks of the female 

 are as large as those of the male, and the weapon itself, generally speaking, 

 is larger than in the Indian species. The African Elephant is not now tamed, 

 though it appears that the Carthaginians employed it in the same way that 

 the inhabitants of India do theirs. 



The second genus of the Proboscidiana is the 



MASTODON, Cuv. 



The Mammoth has been completely destroyed, nor is there a single individual 

 living. It had the feet, tusks, trunk, and many other details of conforma- 

 tion in common with the Elephant; but differed from it in the grinders. 

 M. giganteum. The Great Mastodon, in which the sections of the point* 





