o2C ON THE FOSSIL BONES OF PACHTDERMATOUS QUADRUPEDS, 



To the kindness of MM. Michaelis and Wiedeman, I am indebted 

 for the same drawini^s as large as life, which were formerly communi- 

 cated to Camper. I gave engravings of them in a former edition, but 

 as I have at present better executed engravings of some of the parts, 

 I have only preserved those of the skull and the humerus, and even 

 these I have rectified after those of M. Camper and the originals. M. 

 Adrien Camper having become possessor of the pieces from which 

 these drawings were taken, he sent me the measures and descriptions 

 of them, and I have since had the opportunity of examining the speci- 

 mens themselves at his house. 



Mr. Everard Home, a celebrated English anatomist, has been good 

 enough to have a drawing of the London skeleton executed specially 

 for me. 



The King's Museum has long been in possession of the femur 

 brought home by Longueil, as well as of several teeth ; half of a jaw and 

 two tusks brought by M. Legris from Bellisle have been more recently 

 added to the collection. But the most important acquisition of this 

 description has been the magnificent present received from Mr. Jeffer^ 

 son. This consists of an enormous tusk, the halves of two lower 

 jaws — one of which belonging to a young subject is of the greatest 

 importance in the history of the teeth — a tibia, a radius, and almost all 

 the bones of the tarsus and metatarsus, of the carpus and metacarpus, 

 as vi^ell as the phalanges, the ribs, and the vertebrse. 



It is by means of these divers sources of information that I have 

 been enabled to give an idea of this extraordinary animal ; but before 

 I proceed to examine it in detail, I must conclude the enumeration of 

 the places where its remains have been found. 



From all that can be collected from the accounts of observers, the 

 depots of the bones of the mastodon, as well as of those of the other 

 fossil species, which most frequently accompany them, are more gene- 

 rally found in marshy places, where the salt water attracts the wild 

 animals, and more especially the different species of stags ; and for 

 this reason they have received the name of Licks. 



The most celebrated of these depots — that visited by Longueil, 

 Croghan, and so many others, and that which has given to the masto- 

 don the name of the animal of Ohio, is itself called Great Bone Lick. 



It is in the state of Kentucky, to the left and south-east of the Ohio, 

 four miles from its banks, and thirty-six from the embouchure of the 

 river of Kentucky*, almost opposite that of the river called the Great 

 Miamis. It occupies a space buried betwixt two hills, and forming a 

 marsh fed by a jet of salt water. Its bottom is a black and fetid turf. 

 The bones are found in the slime and on the banks of the marsh, at a 

 depth of more than four feet, according to the account of the late 

 General Collaud, who was present on the spot, and who had collected 

 no less than fcur-and-twenty specimens during four days' labour. Their 

 abundance there is truly astonishing. Croghan supposes that he saw 

 the remains of no less than thirty animals, but those of a much greater 

 number have since been collected. 



They are there accompanied by the bones of many other species. 



* Volney. Picture of, the Climate and Soil of tie United States of America, i. p. 100. 



