58 FLORIDA GEOLOGICAL SURVEY TENTH ANNUAL REPORT. 
in the canal following the heavy rains in this locality of October 
28, 1916. 
THE TAPIRIDAE. 
The Tapiriclae as a whole have proven a conservative as well as 
very persistent group. Genera referred to this family have been 
obtained from as early as the Eocene and Oligocene formations of 
America and Europe. The striking characteristics of the tapirs,, very 
pronounced in the case of the Recent and Quaternary species, are 
the modifications of the skull correlated with the development of the 
upper lip to form a flexible snout or proboscis. The skull modifica- 
tions include the extreme shortening of the nasal bones, which, with 
the deep spiral grooves on the nasals and frontals for the attach- 
ment of the muscles of the proboscis, form the most strikingly dis- 
tinctive skull characters of this remarkable family. The dental 
series, although relatively simple and generalized, presents in the 
Recent and Quaternary species the anomaly of enlarged upper third 
incisors, which, with the lower canines, form tusks, the upper 
canines being reduced in size. 
The existing tapirs include five species. Of these, two species 
are found in Central or Middle America; two in South America; 
and one in Southern Asia. Upon characters presented by the two 
Middle American species, Gill in 1865 established the genus Elas- 
mognathus .* This genus is characterized by a great prolongation 
of the ossification of the nasal partitions (methesmoid) , extending 
in the adult far in front of the nasal bones. The bony mass thus 
formed is embraced and supported at the base by plates rising from 
the maxillaries. The generic name Elasmognathus being preoccu- 
pied, Palmer, in 1903, proposed for this group the name Tapirella, f 
The two recent species of this genus are Tapirella bairdii , found in 
Southern Mexico and Panama, and T. dowi, found in Guatemala 
and Nicaragua. The remaining three, existing species of tapirs are 
placed in the genus Tapirus, in which the ossification of the nasal 
partition does not extend appreciably beyond the nasal bones, and in 
which there is no ascending plate from the maxillaries. The species 
of this genus are Tapirus terrestris and T. roulini of South America 
and T. indicus of Malay, Sumatra and Borneo. 
* Proc. Acad. Nat. Scien. Phil., 1865, p. 185. 
tScience, Vol. 17, p. 873, May 1903. 
