FOSSIL MAMMALIA. 93 



triangular ; and the bone in question, by its thickness, would 

 indicate a lamantin of a size much too large to have the cor- 

 responding teeth ; for, in the cetacea, all the parts of the 

 superior extremity are greatly contracted. To bring the 

 radius of the kangaroo into the question would be absurd, 

 the slender forms of which are so totally diiFerent, 



Every observation, then, concurs to approximate the animals 

 to whom these remains belonged to tapirs; and until it is 

 proved that the incisive and canine teeth do not correspond 

 with those of this genus, they must be referred to it. 



The Baron uses the name, gigantic tapirs^ in the plural 

 number, inasmuch as he observed sufficient discrepancy in size 

 in some of the teeth to warrant him in supposing that there 

 might have been more than one species. That species to 

 which certain of the larger teeth belonged, judging by com- 

 parison with living tapirs, especially with that of India, he 

 thinks might have been eighteen feet long and eleven feet 

 high, equal in size to the largest elephants and to the great 

 mastodon of America. The other individuals, whose teeth 

 were discovered at Carlat and Cheville, might have been 

 somewhat less, but most certainly were very formidable 

 animals. 



It appears that these gigantic tapirs belonged to the same 

 era as the fossil elephants and mastodons ; that they lived with 

 them, and were destroyed by the same catastrophe: their 

 bones are found in the same strata, and sometimes mingled 

 with the others. M. Lockhart observes, that at Avary these 

 bones were found beyond the valley of the Loire, not inclosed 

 in the regular rocky strata ; they were in a bed of sand, im- 

 mediately supported by a calcareous fresh-water formation. 

 This bed is formed of a very variegated sand, composed of 

 small calcareous fragments and rolled quartz, of different sizes 

 and colours. This bed is surmounted by the stratum of 

 vegetable earth. 



