ELEPHANT AND MASTODON. 



57 



written on the subject in the 'Ossemens Fossiles,' Cuvier 

 separated the elephants with manimillated molars from the 

 ordinary forms with lamelliform molars, and united the 

 former into a genus which he designated Mastodon, taking 

 the North American species, under the name of M. giganteus, 

 as the type.^ In the interval between these two memoirs, 

 Peale made the important discovery of two skeletons of the 

 Ohio Fossil, near the banks of the Hudson River, in the 

 State of New York, one of which was brought to Europe in 

 1802, and furnished nearly complete materials for instituting 

 a detailed comparison between the osseous frame of the 

 mastodon and of the existing elephants.^ Cuvier pointed 

 out the entire correspondence between them in the tusks, 

 trunk, and the whole of the skeleton, except the molar teeth. 

 He admitted, even in regard to the latter, that the difference 

 between the transverse mammillated ridges of the mastodon 

 and the thin plates of the elephants is merely one of pro- 

 portion ; but insisted that there is an essential distinction in 

 the circumstance that the spaces between the enamel ridges 

 are filled with ' cement ' in the teeth of the elephant, which 

 is wanting in those of the mastodon. In addition to this 

 supposed difference, he found corresponding modifications in 

 the form of the cranium, which confirmed him in his view 

 of a well-marked generic distinction between Mastodon and 

 Elephas.^ In the same memoir, Cuvier characterized four 

 other species of his new genus, viz. M. angustidens, in which 

 he included all the narrow mastodon molars found in Europe, 

 together with some from America, two species from South 

 America, M. Andium and M. JSumboldtii, and a small Euro- 

 pean sj)ecies, which he named M. minutus. To these was 

 subsequently added, in the'Ossemens Eossiles,' a sixth species, 

 under the name of M. Tajnro'ides. 



In regard to the number and succession of the teeth, while 

 he admitted eight molars on each side of both jaws to the 

 elephant, this great anatomist, not hazarding a conjecture 

 beyond the materials which had come under his eye, was not 

 aware of more than four on each side in the mastodon, or 

 sixteen in all. He was also without the knowledge of the 

 occasional presence of tusks in the lower jaw ; biit he first 

 made the important observation, that in the Mastodo7i angus- 

 tidens a part of the anterior series of molars in the upper jaw 

 is replaced by a vertical successional tooth, or true premolar, 

 thus bringing them under the normal law of the order of 



' Annales du Museum d'Histoire Na- 

 turellu, torn. viii. ' Sur lo grand Masto- 

 doute.' 



■ T.R.Pealc, 'xVceount of tlic Skeleton 



of the Mammoth,' &e. ; and 'Historic. 

 Disquisit.' 1802 and 1803. 

 ' Oss. Foss. torn. i. p. 221. 



