APPENDIX A 303 



My opinion is that this skin belongs to a genuine Pampean Mylodon, 

 preserved under peculiar circumstances resembling those to which we owe 

 the skin and feathers of the Moa. I have always maintained that the 

 Pampean Edentates, now extinct, disappeared only in the epoch which is 

 called the " historical epoch " of our America. In the province of Buenos 

 Aires, buried chiefly in the humus, I have found remains of Panochthus, 

 and others of the same Mylodon from the seashore, all of which present 

 the same characteristic marks of preservation as the remains of human 

 beings discovered in the same spot. In this identical layer of the 

 sea-shore, close to the bones I have also found stones polished by 

 the hand of man, and flints cut like those found in the Pampean 

 formation. In 1884, in a cavern near to the Rio de los Patos, in the 

 Cordillera, I discovered some paintings in red ochre, one of which, 

 in my opinion, resembles the Glyptodon on account of the shape of the 

 carapace. 



Ancient chroniclers inform us that the indigenous inhabitants recorded 

 the existence of a strange, uyl}', huge hairy animal which had its abode in 

 the Cordillera to the south of lat. 37°. The Tehuelches and the Genna- 

 kens have mentioned similar animals to me, of vv'hose existence their 

 ancestors had transmitted the remembrance ; and in the neighbourhood 

 of the Rio Negro, the aged cacique Sinchel, in 1875, pointed out to me 

 a cave, the supposed lair of one of these monsters, called " KUengassen " ; 

 but I must add that none of the many Indians with whom I have con- 

 versed in Patagonia have ever referred to the actual existence of animals 

 to which we can attribute the skin in question, nor even of any which 

 answer to the suppositions of Seuor Ameghino according to Sefior Lista. 

 It is but rarely that a few Otters {Lnira) are found in the lakes and 

 rivers of the Andes, as in the neighbourhood of Lake Argentino, in the 

 " Sierra de las Viscachas," and in the regions which I believe Sefior Lista 

 visited, there are only a few scarce Chinchillas {Ld^i^idiiiitt), which have a 

 colouring more dark greyish than those found to the north, and are in 

 every case separated from these by a large extent of country. 



The Pampean Edentata have in former days certainly existed as far 

 south as the extreme limit of Patagonia. In 1S74, in the bay of Santa 

 Cruz, I met with the remains of a /^/rvV of one of these animals in Pleis- 

 tocene deposits, and also remains of the mammals which are found in the 

 same formation, such as the Macraiicluuia and Auchcnia. It would not 

 be astonishing that the skin of one of these should have been preserved 

 so long, because of the favourable conditions of the spot in which it was 

 found. 



The state of preservation of this piece of skin, at first sight, makes it 

 difficult for one to believe it to be of great anticiuity ; but this is by 

 no means an impossibility, if we consider the conditions of the cave in 



