GREAT ELEPHANT. £19 



phants do not suck by the trunk, but by the 

 mouth, as represented on the plate annexed. 



It is a most curious fact, and may well excite 

 our astonishment, that skeletons resembling those 

 of Elephants are occasionally found in a fossil state, 

 and in large quantities, at a great depth under the 

 surface, in the most northern parts of Asia*. " All 

 the Arctic circle (says Mr. Pennant) is a vast 

 mossy flat, formed of a bed of mud or sand, seem- 

 ing the effect of the sea, and which gives reason 

 to think that that immense tract was in some very 

 distant age won from it. With them are mixed an 

 infinitely greater number of marine bodies than are 

 found in the higher parts of that portion of Asia. 

 I give the fact : let others, more favoured, explain • 

 the cause how these animals were transported from 

 their torrid seats to the Arctic regions : I should 

 have recourse to the only one we have authority 

 for; and think that phenomenon sufficient: I men- 

 tion this, because modern philosophers look out for 

 a later cause : I rest convinced : therefore to avoid 

 contradicting what can never be proved." 



We must by no means here omit the fossil bones, 

 viz. jaws, vertebrae, thigh-bones, and tusks, which 

 are often found in some parts of North America: 

 they are commonly found about five or six feet 

 below the surface, on the banks of the river Ohio, 



* A scrupulous anatomical investigation of these bones seems 

 to prove, according to some late observations of the French natu- 

 ralists, that they are in reality different from those of the Ele- 

 phant, notwithstanding their general similarity ; and are, there- 

 fore, to be numbered among the species of lost animals, known 

 only from their fossil remains. 



