44 FOSSIL MAMMALIA. 



long and eight inches in diameter, though not entire. About 

 1664, some remains of this kind were found at the entrance of 

 the Vatican, in digging foundations. Baccius speaks of similar 

 discoveries in this city as long ago as 158S. And it is much 

 more than probable that the body of Pallas, the son of Evan- 

 der, found, or pretended to have been found, in the reign of 

 the Emperor Henry III., in the middle of the eleventh century, 

 and which was said to have exceeded the walls of the city in 

 height, was nothing but some remains of this description. 



In many other parts of Rome elephantine remains have been 

 found, and in whatever direction an observer may proceed from 

 that city, abundance of such bones will be found. They are 

 discovered throughout all the Papal domains, and, in follow- 

 ing the course of the Tiber, the Clanis, and the Arno into 

 Tuscany, they grow still more numerous. 



It would be endless to notice all the places where fragments 

 have been discovered of the elephant. We must therefore con- 

 fine ourselves to the most remarkable facts. 



In the Val de Chiano, the Grand Duke Ferdinand II., in 

 1663, had an entire skeleton disinterred, some of the bones of 

 which are still preserved at Florence, according to Targione. 

 It is proper to notice, that some of those remains have been 

 found in that sort of consolidated sand, called tufo by the 

 Italians, which contains marine bodies and foreign wood in a 

 state of petrifaction. 



They are so common in the small earth-hills which border 

 the upper part of the Valley of Arno, that the peasants used 

 formerly to employ them, in conjunction with stones, in building 

 those little walls that inclose their farms. But now that they 

 know their value, they preserve them, and sell them to tra- 

 vellers. 



Doctor Targione Tozzetti writes to BuiFon, in 1764, con- 

 cerning the elephantine remains found near the castle of Cerreto 

 Guidi, between the lake of Tucecchio and ihc Arno. He says 

 that they belonged to individuals of very (uflbrcnt ages, some 



