ANIMALS OF LONG AGO 357 



Horse is really its wrist. The "canon bone" corresponds to the 

 middle one of the five metacarpal bones which support the palms 

 of our hands. The remaining bones, commonly called "pastern," 

 "coronary" and "coffin," are the joints of the central digit greatly 

 strengthened. They correspond to the joints of our middle fingers. 

 The second and fourth digits are represented by thin bones like 

 splints. At the base of these splints small bony knots are occasion- 

 ally found, and these may be taken as representing the missing 

 first and fifth digits. Thus we see the Horse actually bears traces 

 of its five-toed ancestor ! Students of embryology (the science of 

 pre-natal developments) assure us that an embryonic foal at an early 

 stage of its growth actually has five toes. This is not surprising 

 in the light of the facts we have already considered. It is a recog- 

 nized principle in embryology that an embryo epitomizes the life 

 history of its ancestors. But the fact noted is further confirmation 

 of the testimony of the rocks. It is also interesting to note that 

 horses are occasionally born in these modern days with two extra 

 hoofed toes depending from the splint bones which have their place 

 on either side of the big toe, now looked upon as a hoofed foot. 

 Julius Ceesar, it was declared by Suetonius in his life of that in- 

 dividual, rode a Horse with almost human feet, with hoofs cleft 

 like toes. Professor Marsh describes a Horse from Cuba, which 

 had two well-grown toes on each foot. 



Remains of the horse's curious ancestors may be seen in the 

 American Museum of Natural History in New York. There is a 

 set of casts of skulls and bones in the London Natural History 

 Museum. It is curious that when America, so conspicuously the 

 home of the Horse's ancestors, was discovered, it yielded no traces 

 of the modern Horse. The wild Horses of the Pampas are the 

 descendants of Horses introduced by Spanish colonists at least three 

 centuries ago. 



SABRE-TOOTHED TIGER. — The extinct Sabre-Toothed Tiger, 

 called the Machcerodus (Greek, machaira, a sabre), figured on 

 Plate XI, roamed the earth in Pliocene times, and a terrible enemy 

 it must have been to its herbivorous contemporaries, which included 

 in their number ancestors of our Camels, Deer, Antelopes and 

 Apes. It was the monarch of the Pliocene forests. Its canine teeth 

 resembled the blade of a poignard, and by their instrumentality 

 the animal could easily and effectively rip the hides even of the 

 Pachyderms. The teeth blades were some twelve inches long. In 



