60 



TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



tus, bear considerable analogy with those of the Masto- 

 don ; they are covered in a similar manner with enamel, 

 and furnished alike with transverse mamillary eminences 

 in the young animal, which by detrition present disks, 

 more or less resembling each other in the teeth of these 

 different animals ; thus, a superficial observer might 

 readily confound our fossil tooth with that of a young 

 Mastodon, was not its size at least one half smaller than 

 the smallest of the milk molars of the Mastodon that 

 have come under the observation of naturalists. Mr. 

 Cooper has casually remarked, (vid. Notices of Big- 

 big-bone-lick, Am. Monthly Journ. of Geology, p. 163, 

 in a note,) "Among these [the molars of the Mastodon,] 

 I include one similar to the tooth, also from Big-bone- 

 lick, described by Dr. Harlan, as having belonged to an 

 extinct species of Tapir. That it is a young Masto- 

 don's tooth, is evident, I think, from the milk teeth still 

 remaining in the head on which the supposed genus 

 Tetracaulodon is founded, as well as from the small jaw 

 above described." 



It is difficult to conceive in what manner *• the milk 

 teeth remaining in the head" of this or that animal, 

 could prove any thing concerning the nature of the 

 tooth in question. Mr. C. probably means to say that 

 he compared the tooth of my fossil Tapir with those in 

 the jaws of young Mastodons ; I also have made similar 

 comparisons, and have carried comparisons still further. 

 Taking the disputed tooth in question to Paris, I com- 

 pared it in presence of naturalists skilled for their ob- 

 servation, with the teeth of the various Tapirs, pre- 



