34C ON THE FOSSIL BONES OF PACHYDERMATOUS QUADRUPEDS. 



skeleton, we cannot thence infer that the latter have belonged to an 

 animal of the middle size. 



Calculating by the largest teeth which have been found isolated, a 

 calculation oftentimes liable to exaggeration, we shall find that they 

 belonged to animals of eleven feet three or four inches at the utmost : 

 and the tibia in the cabinet of M. Camper, to which I have already 

 adverted, would indicate one eleven feet eight inches. Thus, as we 

 stated at the commencement of the chapter, there is no piece extant 

 which may serve to prove that the mastodon ever attained, far less sur- 

 passed, twelve feet. 



The skeleton of Mr. Peale measures 15' English, or 4,55 from the 

 chin to the croup, as he expressed it. I fancy he means to say, from 

 the end of the snout to the posterior edge of the ischium. 



This dimension of the elephant is not more considerable than his 

 height : an elephant ten feet high would not measure quite eleven feet 

 in length, or 3,57 ; so that the mastodon was much longer in pro- 

 portion to its height than the elephant. A very fair idea of this may be 

 formed by comparing my plate 23 with my plate 7, upon elephants. 



10. The Feet. 



According to Mr. Peale (Hist. Disq. page 57), the hind feet are 

 strikingly smaller than the fore feet. In the fore feet, according to 

 the same authority, the second phalanges terminate by grooves, which 

 seems to indicate that the third phalanges, or unguals, were capable 

 of more action than the same parts of the elephant, and bore a greater 

 resemblance to those of the hippopotanms. 



Thanks to the generosity of Mr. Jefferson, we are now enabled to 

 form more exact comparisons on this subject. In general, these bones 

 resemble those of the elephant, as must necessarily be the case in two 

 animals so much akin to each other. Neither the scaphoid of the 

 carpus, or the trapezium, or the trapezoides, or the pisiforme, have been 

 met with. 



The semilunar (pi. 25, fig. 2) is much more depressed than in the 

 elephant, that is to say, it is much broader and less high. It is also 

 shorter from front to rear; in other respects its shapes and surfaces 

 are almost the same. The same depression likewise exists in the cunei- 

 form e, but in a less degree. 



The cuneiforme (fig. 3) is as the proportion of the semilunar, that 

 is to say, longer and less high than that of the elephant. We have 

 only had an opportunity of seeing this bone slightly mutilated, so 

 that we have been unable to compare the shapes of its surfaces. 

 »* As for the os magnum (fig. 4), it must have occupied less space 

 transversely, in proportion, for its proportional dimensions are almost 

 the same as those of the elephant. The bones of the metacarpus which 

 I have seen, are all shorter and thicker in proportion than those of 

 the elephant. This shape is more especially marked in that of the 

 index (pi. 25, fig. 6), which, without being longer than that of an 

 elephant eight feet high, is doubly as broad : besides, the articulating 

 surface of the trapezoid is convex, and broader than that of the ele- 

 phant; the articulation of the trapezium is longer, and that which cor- 

 responds with the metacarpa of the medius is less vertiqal. 



