46 



organizations of animal bodies, where, for example, " the feet accord 

 with the characters announced by the teeth ; the teeth are in harmony 

 with those indicated previously by the feet." 



The immensity, of organic fossil deposits, mostly fragmentary, many 

 of wondrous shapes and generally of unallied kinds, promiscuously 

 mingled, presents to the comparative anatomist a vast and too frequently 

 a seductive field for imaginative speculation; and the fertile and heated 

 brain, armed with such materials, is led to fabricate monsters as 

 anomalous in their structural characters as those of heathen creations, 

 or of the Middle Ages, and accepted as truthful by the credulous with 

 an implicit belief. 



So the pictorial illustration, acknowledged by the author himself to 

 have been founded on error, still remains in works on Natural History, 

 the stereotyped form of the Deinotherium giganteum. 



Computing from this standard, the length of the animal is estimated 

 at about 18 feet ; but this magnitude would be greatly exceeded should 

 it hereafter be ascertained that this singular being was truly aquatic 

 in its habits. 



Dr. Buckland suggests that the large incisive tusks served probably 

 for tearing up and raking together the strong-rooted plants which grew 

 in fresh-water rivers and lakes, and which probably constituted the diet 

 of this pachyderm ; for mooring purposes during repose ; for dragging 

 the immense carcass along the bed of the river or up its banks ; and for 

 weapons of oiFence and defence : in short, precisely similar in their uses 

 to the effective upper canines of the "Walrus. 



Other fragmentary relics of the genus have been discovered in various 

 parts of Europe and Asia, but their specific determination is still 

 involved in considerable obscurity. The following list of species is 

 about the best I can offer, although by no means so perfect as could be 

 desired. 



1. Deinotheeium gigakteum, Kaup. 



Syn. — Tapir gigcmtesque, Cuvier. 



Deinotherium maximum, Eaup. 

 „ meditim, Kaup. 



2. Deihothebium Cttvieei, K^up. 



Bja.— Deinotherium iavaricum, de Meyer. 

 „ secundarius, Kaup. 



„ Konigii, Kaup. 



3. DEiNOTHEEirM MrNTJTUM, de Meyer. 



4. DEiNOTHEBitTM PHOATUM, Eichwald. 



Syn. — Tapirm proavus, Eichwald. 



Mastodon podolicus, Eichwald. 



5. Dedjotheeium nrDicim, Cantley and Falconer. 



