THE MASTODON. 35 



monster of Loth land and sea falls a victim to the fierce, 

 carnivorous creature. On the right, emerging from the 

 cloud of dust, shuffling along, comes another beast, with 

 long white curved, massive tusks, twelve feet in length, 

 and from the under jaw proceeds another a foot in length. 

 It looks like an elephant, and yet it is not ; at full speed it 

 moves along, and holding in its long black trunk a ponder- 

 ous limb with its branches, it furiously beats its sides to 

 brush away the great insects, as large as barn-swallows, 

 which sting and goad it into fury ; still hastening on, it 

 plunges into a stream where it is released from its tormen- 

 tors. This animal is the mastodon, and in the distance 

 may be seen not less than ten species of them. 



From the contemplation of this varied scenery, and the 

 thoughts awakened by the struggles incident to the animal 

 world, our spectator, still in his altitude of observation, is 

 startled by deep rolling thunder in the distance which gives 

 notice of an approaching storm. Looking over the landscape 

 again he sees untold numbers of animals hastening from 

 the woods and over the plains to the mountains beyond ; a 

 troup of mastodons come crashing through the woods, 

 driven by fear and leaving destruction in their trail ; a herd 

 of wild horses are galloping over the meadows ; the Siva- 

 therium (a deer having the bulk of an elephant) breaks 

 from the forest and is soon lost to view ; the strange and 

 frightened actions of the dogs, lions, antelopes, oxen, etc., 

 forbode the gathering of a terrific storm, ^o sooner has 

 the last animal disappeared, than the deep, thick, impene- 

 trable masses of clouds gather around. Tremblingly our 

 spectator leaves the rock to seek protection in a neighbor- 

 ing cave ; at the cavern's entrance he pauses to look 

 around, when there flashed a stream of light so vivid, so 

 intensely bright, sundering the very heavens, as it were, 

 and immediately followed by a peal of thunder that shook 

 the very fastnesses of the mountain, and then the storm 



