PROFESSOR OWEN ON THE MEGATHERIUM. 
367 
either jaw, which are all perfect and double, but whether or not there be the rudiment 
of a tooth behind cannot be distinctly ascertained, unless the glass case which covers 
the specimen be removed ; for there is no door or any way of getting close to the 
skeleton. I should advise a memorial to be drawn up stating the reasons for wishing 
the point to be determined, in which case, perhaps, the authorities might consent to 
allow a pane of glass to be removed.” 
Fortunately the necessity of the endeavour to overcome these obstacles was in great 
measure obviated by the arrival in 1845, in this country, of a very important and 
remarkable accession of remains of the Megatherium, discovered in 1837, near 
Luxan, Buenos Ayres, which, with other fossils of large extinct South American 
animals, were purchased by the Trustees of the British Museum. This collection 
included an entire cranium and lower jaw of the Megatherium ; the entire tail.; 
complete series of the bones of both fore- and hind-feet: — in short, parts which, in 
combination with those previously deposited in the Museum of the Royal College of 
Surgeons, by Sir Woodbine Parish and Mr. Darwin, completed the entire skeleton 
of the animal, including the hyoid and sesamoid bones, which are too often wanting 
in the skeletons of our recent and common quadrupeds. 
Accurate plaster casts of the huge pelvis and most of the other bones of the Mega- 
therium in the College Museum had been prepared at the expense of the College and 
presented to the British Museum : and, after an examination and comparison of the 
whole series of the remains of the Megatherium in both collections, and a consulta- 
tion with the ingenious articulator of the Mylodon, Mr. Flower, I suggested to 
the able keeper of the Mineralogical Department in the British Museum, Charles 
Konig, K.H., F.R.S., the advantage which would arise, if similar plaster casts should 
be taken of all the other bones of the skeleton, and if such casts, coloured to match 
the original bones, should be mounted ; the originals being preserved separate, for 
the greater facility of their comparison and for the advantage of examining their 
articular surfaces. 
The Trustees of the British Museum having taken the proposition under mature 
consideration, the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons having liberally 
sanctioned the moulding of all the requisite bones in their Museum, and my own con- 
sent to superintend the co-adjustment and attitude of the skeleton having been given, 
the models and plaster casts were ordered by the Trustees to be made, and their 
articulation was confided to Mr. Flower. 
The result is the exhibition in our National Museum of the entire skeleton of the 
Megatherium, Plate XVII., in a much more complete state, and, I believe I may 
add, more natural attitude, than that of the same extraordinary quadruped, which 
previously had been unique and the glory of the Royal Museum of Natural History 
at Madrid. 
For the full fruition by comparative anatomists and paleontologists of so rich an 
accession to our evidences of one of the strangest animals of a former world, there still 
MDCCCLV. 3 D 
