268 THE AGE OF MAMMALS 



there stretched verdant lowlands in which grassy plains alternated with 

 magnificent forests. These regions harbored a varied mammalian life: 

 here were two-horned rhinoceroses, huge bears, monkeys romping among 

 the rocks, and carnivores, of the civet, marten, and cat families, lying in 

 wait for their prey; grottos of Pentelican marble served hyajnas as habi- 

 tations, while immense troops of hipparions, like those of the quaggas and 

 zebras in Africa to-day, occupied the plains. No less swift, and even more 

 beautiful, were the antelopes, asscmliled in large herds according to their 

 various species, and distinguished by the form of their horns. Palceoreas 

 had spiral horns, Antidorcas lyre-shaped; in Palceoryx they were long and 

 arched, in some species they resembled those of the gazelles, while Tra- 

 gocerus had horns that approached those of the goats; Palceotragus was a 

 slender, narrow-headed form with horns placed directly above the eyes. 

 Helladotherium and a giraffe even more closely related to the recent ones 

 were predominant in size among the ruminants. Ancylotherium was re- 

 garded (1862) as an edentate with hooked claws of huge proportions, but 

 is now recognized as the last stage in the evolution of the perissodactyl 

 chalicotheres. The most majestic animal of all was Dinotherium, which 

 together with two kinds of mastodon represented the proboscideans. There 

 was heard the roar of the terrible machserodonts, called saber-tooth tigers 

 on account of their dagger-like upper canines. . . . There is a conspicuous 

 absence of small animals (p. 333) : beside some turtles, a lizard and some 

 birds, there are only a rather large porcupine (Hystrix), a skunk-like form 

 (Promephitis), and a marten (Mustela) slightly larger than the European 

 marten of to-day. No trace of the bat nor of an insectivore has been dis- 

 covered. The absence of small forms can be accounted for by the peculiar 

 conditions of deposition of the Pikermi beds. The strong currents neces- 

 sary to bring together the vast number of gigantic bones must have been 

 sufficiently powerful to sweep all smaller ones away.^ A. Smith Wood- 

 ward believes that the Pikermi bone beds are due to some catastrophe by 

 which the animals were suddenly destroyed at several distant points; 

 the bodies were hurried by torrential floods through thickets or tree-ob- 

 structed water-courses before reaching the shallow basins in which they 

 finally rested. This phenomenon appears to have been repeated. The 

 hipparions," together with the numerous gazelles and probably Hellado- 

 therium, lived on the grass of the great prairies; certain girafTes were l^rowsers, 

 and Palceotragus, probably a long-necked form, but smaller than the giraffe, 

 fed on the leaves of the lower branches of trees. The affinities of the 

 Pikermi fauna, concluded Gaudry, are not with that of modern Europe, but 

 of Africa, and this resemblance becomes more and more striking as we pro- 

 ceed to a closer examination of the faunas. We are thus led to the conclusion 

 that at this time a land connection existed between Europe and Africa. 



^ Woodward, A. S., The Bone-Beds of Pikermi, Attica, and Similar Deposits in Euboea. 

 Geol. Mag., n.s., Dec. IV, Vol. VIII, Nov., 1901, p. 485. 



