MEGATHERIUM. 
IGI 
It remains to consider, of what use this cuirass 
l^ould have been to the gigantic animal on which 
probably was placed. As the locomotive 
gans of the Megatherium indicate very slow 
power of progression, the weight of a cuirass 
^ ou d have afforded little impediment to such 
ar y movements; its use was probably defen- 
sive, not only against the tusks and claws of 
'leasts of prey, but also, against the myriads of 
insects, that usually swarm in such climates as 
those wherein its bones are found ; and to which 
an animal that obtained its food by digging 
eneath a broiling sun, would be in a peculiar 
Megatherium; other portions of it, 
an.mJs * ^ other 
from more th*""' of bones and armour, derived 
is found in tl"’" T ^ 
ountrv 1 distant points of 
armour was tuld wTth 'f"’ 
in the bed of tC VI ? 7 ^"^S'nents of the large skeleton, 
part of it le r ft a’ broad flattened surface of I 
P the crest of the ileum of this skeleton, (see PI 5 Fip- 2 
of cettatnXV' b T’,' P-^ion 
P>-essure s 1 1 i t evidence of 
skeleton’ of ti**^*^ ^ analogous parts of the 
t'lat the Me7t! "'o might have inferred 
bad nosne7^ ‘^““™ ^ covered with heavy armour, even 
®ther na t>een discovered near bones of this animal in 
flattened 1 Paraguay. In all these 
of th b effects of pressure are confined to those parts 
as oc * ^ olou, on which the armour would rest, and are Such 
cur in a remarkable degree in the Armadillo. 
G. 
M 
