286 



LIVING AND EXTINCT ELEPHANTS. 



strength, projection, and number of the enamel-edges, the 

 ivory and cement being, in the mechanical aspect, but the 

 setting in which the plates are fixed. In the molar of the 

 Indian Elephant they are like the edges of thick plates of 

 corrugated iron, having a considerable amount of relief; 

 while in the Mammoth they are like the edges of thinner 

 flat plates of the same metal, barely elevated above their 

 level setting, but more numerous, in the same extent of 

 grinding surface, in the ratio of 5 to 4. In the former, the 

 tough and ligneous matters which it is known to select for its 

 food tell upon the triturating elements, as might be predi- 

 cated, in the ratio of their densities. The soft cement is 

 worn lowest, the plate of ivory forms a depressed band, and 

 the enamel-plates project over both — the wider intervals by 

 which they are separated contributing to facilitate the me- 

 chanical result required in the case. In the Mammoth the 

 plane of the setting remains flat, and the enamel-edges are 

 but slightly in relief above it. The- molar in the palate of 

 a Mammoth from Eschscholtz Bay, in the Palseontological 

 gallery of the British Museum, may be cited in illustration. 

 If hard woody fibre entered more largely into the food of the 

 fossil than it does into that of the existing species it is 

 difficult to conceive why corresponding mechanical results 

 should not have followed, in the greater proportional erosion 

 of the cement. 



It has been argued, and the reasoning has met with very 

 general acceptance, ' that ' if we find in an extinct Elephant 

 the same peculiar principle of construction in the molar 

 teeth' (i.e. as in the living forms), 'but with augmented 

 complexity, arising from a greater number of triturating 

 plates and a greater proportion of the dense enamel, the 

 inference is plain that the ligneous fibre must have entered 

 in a larger proportion into the food of such extinct species.' 2 

 But there are objections to the terms here used, as accurately 

 expressive of the difference, which are opposed to the infer- 

 ence. It is true that there is a greater number of thinner 

 enamel-plates, in the same extent of triturating surface, 

 which thus becomes more composite ; but it is not so that 

 there is a greater proportion of dense enamel, nor that the 

 crown is more complex. The greater thickness of the plates 

 in the Indian species compensates for their more frequent 

 repetition in the fossil form ; while their strong undulation 



1 The deduction here referred to has 

 been adopted by the distinguished 

 authors of the ' Geology of Eussia,' in 

 their disquisition on the ' Habitation and 

 Destruction of the Mammoths,' with a 



very high estimate of its importance, as 

 a result of pateontological research. 

 Op. cit. vol. i. p. 497. 

 2 Brit. Foss. Manini., p. 268. 



