134 



RIO TF.RCERO 



sidered as exaggeration. Yet I could never find a spot where, 

 b\- slowl)' turning round, objects were not seen at greater 

 distances in some directions than in others ; and this manifestly 

 proves inequality in the plain. At sea, a person's eye being 

 six feet above the surface of the water, his horizon is two miles 

 and four-fifths distant. In like manner, the more level the 

 plain, the more nearl}- does the horizon approach within these 

 narrow limits ; and this, in my opinion, entirch' destroys that 

 grandeur which one would ha\-e imagined that a vast level 

 plain would have pos.sessed. 



October \st. — W'c started b\' moonlight and arrived at the 



TOXODON PLATENSrS. FOUKD !\T .'^AL.^DI LLO. 



Rio Tercero by sunrise. This river is also called the Saladillo, 

 and it deserves the name, for the water is brackish. I stayed 

 here the greater part of the day, searching for fossil bones. 

 Besides a perfect tooth of the Toxodon, and many scattered 

 bones, I found two immense skeletons near each other, project- 

 ing in bold relief from the perpendicular cliff of the Parana. 

 They were, however, so completely decayed, that I could only 

 bring awa)' small fragments of one of the great molar teeth ; 

 but these are sufficient to show that the remains belonged to 

 a Mastodon, probably to the same species with that which 

 formerly must have inhabited the Cordillera in Upper Peru in 

 such great numbers. The men who took me in the canoe said 



