470 



THE GEOLOGIST. 



But we also find animals which, from all our previous pre-conceived 

 associations, we had considered peculiar to the old world. The Ele- 

 phants, of which one species (E. Africomus) now exists in Africa, a 

 second (E. Indicus) in India, and a third (E. Sumatranus) in Sumatra 

 and Ceylon, apart from the extensive and widely-distributed evidences 

 which we find of their fossil remains in Europe, India, China, and Aus- 

 tralia, extended their geographical province in the later Tertiary age 

 over the whole of North America. The species of elephant which we find 

 in Siberia (E. primigenius) has also been found over the whole of the 

 space lately marked on our maps as the United States. South of the 

 30th degree of N. latitude it however gives place to a totally different 

 species of true Elephant (Elephas Texianus, Owen, E. Columbi? Fal- 

 coner), the molars of which, by their less degree of complexity, were 

 more adapted to triturate the soft succulent herbage of Texas and 

 Mexico. Besides these true Elephants, there existed in North Ame- 

 rica many individuals of the genus Mastodon, to which the present 

 communication more particularly alludes. The Mastodon Ohioticus of 

 Blumenbach (giganteus, Cuv.) has been found in Post-Pliocene de- 

 posits in North America, while in the Southern part of that continent 

 the two species, Mastodon Andium and Humboldtii, supposed to be 

 distinct, are found in various localities, to which I shall more parti- 

 cularly allude. 



The Editor of the 13th volume of the " Quarterly Journal of the 

 Geological Society," page 291, states, that "the Mastodon Andium 

 occurs in Peru, Chile, and Tarija ; and that the M. Humboldtii occurs 

 in Buenos Ayres, Brazil, and Columbia." He refers to Gervais and 

 Laurillard as proofs of this statement. The reference to Tarija, how- 

 ever, is a slip of the pen, as Gervais, in Castelnau's voyage, identifies 

 the species found there as Humboldtii. We have thus two species of 

 Mastodon in South America ; and it is alleged by Laurillard that the 

 one (Andium) is confined to the elevated regions of the Cordillera de 

 los Andes, and that the other (Humboldtii) is found in the watersheds 

 of the Amazon, Orinoco, and La Plata. It will scarcely prove a 

 matter of surprise to the philosophical geologist, that the species 

 (Andium) which has the greatest vertical range should also have the 

 greatest horizontal range in space. The M. Andium has been found 

 at a further distance from the equator than any other Proboscidean 

 quadruped in the southern hemisphere, excepting in Australia. At 

 the lake Tagua-tagua, in about latitude S. 35 degrees, are found the 

 remains of this animal, as well as of deer in great profusion. They have 

 been described to the world by De Blainville (" Osteographie," art. 

 Elejyhas), by Claudio Gay (" Historia Fisica y Politica de Chile," Ma- 

 malogia Fossil, plate 8), and by Mr. W. Bollaert, F.B.G.S. (" Geol. 

 Journal," xiii. 1857, p. 291). It is a singular fact that the last writer 

 should have been fortunate enough to discover the first elephantine 

 remains in Texas, showing the furthest southern limit of the genus, 

 FJcphas Texianus in North America, and that he should also have 

 been a witness to the furthest southern limit in Chile of the contem- 

 porary form, Mastodon Andium, in South America. The present 



