64 FOSSIL MAMMALIA. 



elephant, but the teeth to the hippopotamus. But the con- 

 trary opinion even then was held by many. Another French 

 officer informed Buffon that the Indians of Canada and 

 Louisiana believed these bones to belong to a peculiar animal 

 which they csMedi father of oxen. 



The large teeth with eight or ten points, which could not 

 reasonably be confounded with those of the hippopotamus, 

 were already known. One of them was even engraved by 

 Guettard, in the Memoirs of the Academy for 1752. 



When our countrymen became masters of Canada, these 

 researches were pursued with fresh activity. Many of these 

 bones were discovered south-east of the Ohio, by Croghan, 

 the geographer, in 1765. The tuberculous teeth and tusks 

 were found mingled together, without any elephantine molar, 

 and the notion of a peculiar animal became more and more 

 confirmed. This last-mentioned gentleman sent several chests 

 of these fragments to London, and from a lower-jaw which was 

 among them, William Hunter demonstrated that the animal 

 in question differed sensibly from the elephant, and had no- 

 thing in common with the hippopotamus. 



BufFon first maintained that similar teeth were to be found 

 in the ancient continent. He founded this opinion on a tooth 

 presented to him by the Count de Vergennes, said to have 

 been discovered in Little Tartary. It weighed eleven pounds 

 four ounces. Another, from the cabinet of the Abbe Chappe, 

 was supposed to have come from Siberia. Pallas advanced 

 the same opinion on teeth with six points, found in the Oural 

 mountains. The Baron, however, is inclined to regard these 

 proofs as insufficient, inasmuch as it is by no means certain 

 that the specimens in question did not come from America. 



Camper, in 1777, showed again that there was more analogy 

 between the mastodon and- elephant, than between it and the 

 hippopotamus. He also deemed it very probable that it had a 

 trunk. A considerable portion of the cranium and some other 

 bones were found by Dr. Brown, in 1715. 



