THEORY OF THE EARTH, 



described as in BufFon and even better, for Buffbri 

 has mistaken and confused the natural history of 

 the ant-eaters, has mixed the description of the 

 jaguar with that ojf the red wolf, and has confound- 

 ed the American bison with the aurochs, or urus, 

 of Poland. Pennant, it is true, was the first natu- 

 ralist who clearly distinguished the musk ox ; but 

 it had been long mentioned by travellers. The 

 cloven-footed, or Chilese, horse of Molina, has not 

 been described by any of the early Spanish travel- 

 lers, but its existence is more than doubtful, and 

 the authority of Molina is too suspicious to entitle 

 us to believe that this animal actually exists. The 

 Muflon of the blue mountains is the only American 

 quadruped of any size hitherto known, of whick 

 the discovery is entirely modern; and perhaps it 

 may only have been an argali, that had strayed from 



eastern Siberia over the ice.* 







After all that has been said, it is quite impossible 

 to conceive that the enormous mastedontes and gi- 

 gantic megatheriarf whose bones have been disco- 

 vered under ground in North and South America, 



* The argali had long before been mentioned by writers as inhabit- 

 ing Kamtschatka, the Kurili islands, and probably the north-west 

 coast of America and California. Transl. 



t These are new names devised to characterize the animals of whieh 

 the bones and teeth have been found in large quantities in America, 

 both in Virginia, on the banks of ths Ohio, and in Chili and Peru. 



