252 EUROPEAN FOSSIL ELEPHANTS. 



argument. I shall confine myself briefly, and with diffidence, 

 to the results to which one observer, whose -attention has 

 been earnestly fixed on the subject, has been conducted. 



If there is one fact, which is impressed on the conviction 

 of the observer with more force than any other, it is the per- 

 sistence and uniformity of the characters of the molar teeth 

 in the earliest known Mammoth, and his most modern suc- 

 cessor. They maintain unchanged the same numerical for- 

 mula of the colliculi, in the successive teeth ; the same great 

 breadth of crown relatively to its length ; the same con- 

 densation of the constituent materials ; the same narrow 

 parallel-sided transverse bands in the discs of wear ; the 

 same general absence of crimping in, and tenuity of, the 

 enamel-plates ; and uniformly the same flatness of the plane 

 of wear. It may be urged, that the observation is here 

 limited to the characters of a single organ, and that to 

 justify any well-founded generalization, the comparison 

 should be carried throughout the skeleton. The objection 

 would apply forcibly in the case of living forms ; not merely 

 the skeleton, but the soft parts, and the texture and colour- 

 ing of the dermal appendages, would all require to be taken 

 into account. But with fossil forms this is manifestly im- 

 possible. The compass of a single life would hardly suffice, 

 even, for a rigorous comparison of the details of the skeleton 

 in all the geographical localities and geological deposits in 

 which the remains of the Mammoth have been found. The 

 observer is thus constrained to a selection. Through a wide 

 range of observation on living forms, we know the constancy 

 with which the characters of the teeth are maintained in the 

 same species ; and having faith in the order of nature, we 

 extend the rule to extinct forms. The result of my observa- 

 tion is, that the ancient Mammoth of the pre-glacial ' Forest- 

 bed' of the Norfolk coast differs less from the later form 

 occurring on the banks of the Lena, than does the latter 

 from the comparatively modern Mammoth of the superficial 

 bogs of North America, which I regard as being only a slight 

 geographical variety of the same species. 



The same evidence, I believe, is borne by the organs of 

 locomotion ; but the exposition of this part of the case is 

 beyond the limits of the present occasion. 



Assuming the observation to be correct, what strong proof 

 does it not afford of the j)ersistence and constancy through- 

 out vast intervals of time, of the distinctive characters of 

 those organs which are most concerned in the existence and 

 habits of the species ? If we cast a glance back on the long 

 vista of physical changes which our planet has undergone 

 since the Neozoic Epoch, we can nowhere detect signs of a 



