TERTIARY AGE. 



503 



group contain the bones of whale-like animals, between the whale and 

 seal in their relations, one of which — the Zeuglodon cetoides — was 

 seventy feet or more in length. The teeth, vertebrae, and other parts 

 of the skeleton, have been found in the States of Mississippi, Ala- 

 bama, Georgia, and South Carolina; and so abundantly, that many of 

 these Eocene whales were probably stranded together, in a common 

 catastrophe, on that shore of the Mexican Gulf. Some of the vertebrae 

 have a length of a foot and a half, and a diameter of a foot. Fig. 917 

 represents one of the molar teeth, the yoke-like form of which suggested 

 the name Zeuglodon (from £euyA?7, yoke, and 6§ov%, tooth). 



The Mammals, whose remains are most abundant in the fresh-water 



Fig. 918. 



Tapirus Indicus, the modern Malayan Tapir. 



Tertiary of the West, are non-ruminant Ungulates or Herbivores, 

 having their nearest kin, among living kinds, in the Tapir, Rhinoceros, 

 Horse, and Peccary (Mexican Wild Boar, of the genus Dicotyles). 



The Wahsntch group, the earliest affording Tertiary Mammals, has 

 been found to be rich in species in Colorado, and also in New Mexico 

 and Wyoming. 



Among the kinds, the Coryphodonts are of special interest, because 

 of their prototype characters, and the occurrence also of species in the 

 earliest Tertiary beds of Europe. They were about as large as the 

 Malayan Tapir, and had similar shortish legs, but they had none of the 

 special family characters of Tapirs, or of other Ungulates, being in 

 most respects a non-specialized form of Ungulate : having the number 

 of teeth, 44, the full normal number (3 incisors, 1 canine, 4 premolars, 

 and 3 molars, on each side, above and below) ; having, also, the feet 

 all equal, with the number of toes on each five ; and the nose not ab- 

 normal in being adapted for mechanical work, as it is in the Tapir, 

 Hog, and Elephant. The canine teeth, however, were prominent, 

 suggesting the Wild Boars on one side and Carnivores on the other. 



