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been of a genus near to that of tapir, and to that of rhinoceros, by 
the form of its grinders. That it was an herbivorous animal is cer- 
tain ; and that it belonged to the order of pachydermata is confirmed, 
as will be seen, by the structure of its feet. 
The glenoid cavity, for the articulation of the jaw, had a flat sur- 
face, as in that of the tapir ; and as, in the tapir, this cavity was 
bounded backward by a transverse vertical plate : — a peculiarity, 
however, exists, with respect to this plate ; for that of the tapir has 
its internal edge more forward, and the external more backward ; 
whilst in this animal it is exactly contrary. 
In the horse this plate is very short, and is from right to left. In 
the ruminating animals it is more projecting and entirely transverse ; 
or, as in the tapir, more drawn back to the outer edge. It makes 
less projection in the hog : that of the rhinoceros is not behind, but 
at the inner edge of the glenoid cavity ; and the elephant has none. 
It appears that no known animal has the glenoid cavity formed like 
that of the palceotherium. 
By the most ingenious inferences from the form and the number of 
bones constituting the nostrils, and from other characters, he was led 
to conclude that this animal possessed a kind of snout, or trunk, 
resembling that of the tapir. Judging of the size of the first animal 
of this genus, whose remains he discovered, he concluded that it must 
have been less than the tapir, and nearly as large as a common hog ; 
and directed by the proportions which its remains bore to those of 
other species, which he afterwards met with, he designated this 
species as Palceotherium medium. 
From an astragalus, and from several other bones remarkable for 
their thickness, he decidedly made out the existence of another 
species, rather less than the P. medium, but which he conceived it 
right to name P. crassum. 
By his investigations, M. Cuvier discovered the fossil remains of 
another animal, differing in no respect but in being more than double its 
size, from the P. medium. This animal, which he supposes must have 
