APPENDIX A 313 



extinct Mammoth and Rhinoceros from Siberia in the Imperial Academy 

 of Sciences at St. Petersburg ; I have also carefully studied the remair.s 

 of the neck and legs of the Moa from a cavern in New Zealand, now in 

 the British Museum. Compared with these shrivelled and dried specimens, 

 the piece of skin from Patagonia has a remarkably fresh and modern 

 aspect ; and I should unhesitatingly express the opinion that it belonged 

 to an animal killed shortly before Dr. Moreno recognised its interest, had 

 he not been able to give so circumstantial an account of its discovery and 

 strengthened his point of view by recording the occurrence of a human 

 mummy of an extinct race in another cavern in the same district. The 

 presence of an abundant covering of dried serum on one cut border of the 

 skin is alone suggestive of grave doubts as to the antiquity of the speci- 

 men ; but Dr. Vaughan Harley tells me that similar dried serum has 

 been observed several times among the remains of the Egyptian mummies, 

 and there seems thus to be no limit to the length of time for which it can 

 be preserved, provided it is removed from all contact with moisture. I 

 may add that I have searched in vain in the writings of Ramon Lista 

 (so far as they are represented in the Library of the Royal Geographical 

 Society) for some reference to the statement which the late traveller made 

 verbally to Dr. Ameghino ; and as the piece of skin now described 

 certainly represents an animal almost gigantic in size compared with the 

 Old- World Pangolin, I fear it cannot be claimed to belong to Lista's 

 problematical quadruped, whatever that may prove to be. 



The final result of these brief considerations is therefore rather dis- 

 appointing. There are difficulties in either of the two possible hypotheses. 

 We have a piece of skin quite large enough to have belonged to the 

 extinct Mylodon ; but unfortunately it cannot be directly compared with 

 the dermal armour of that genus, because it seems to belong to the neck- 

 region, while the only dermal tubercles of a Mylodont hitherto definitely 

 made known are referable to the lumbar region. If it does belong to 

 Mylodon, as Dr. Moreno maintains, it implies either that this genus 

 survived in Patagonia to a comparatively recent date, or that the circum- 

 stances of preservation were unique in the cavern where the specimen was 

 discovered. On the other hand, if it belongs to a distinct and existing 

 genus, as Dr. Ameghino maintains — and as most of the characters of the 

 specimen itself would at first sight suggest — it is indeed strange that so 

 large and remarkable a quadruped should have hitherto escaped detection 

 in a country which has been so frequently visited by scientific explorers. 



[P.S. — At the reading of this paper Prof Ray Lankester remarked 

 that he should regard the characters of the hair as specially important, 

 and would not be surprised if the problematical piece of skin proved to 

 belong to an unknown type of Armadillo. This possibility had occurred 



