i 3 2 
LIFE OF DEAN BUCKLAND. 
[CH. V. 
of exterior soft iron, than if the entire mass were of hard 
steel. By a similar contrivance, two cutting edges are 
produced on the crown of the molar teeth of the mega¬ 
therium. As the surfaces of these teeth must have worn 
away with much rapidity, a provision, unusual in molar 
teeth, and similar to that in the incisor teeth of the beaver 
and other rodentia, supplied the loss that was continually 
going on at the crown, by the constant addition of new 
matter at the root, which for this purpose remained hollow 
and filled with pulp during the whole life of the animal. 
“ His teeth indicated a peculiarity of structure : they were 
not calculated to eat leaves or grass ; they were not calcu¬ 
lated to eat flesh ; he was an eater of vegetables. YV hat 
then remained for him but roots? He has a spade and he 
has a hoe and a shovel in those three claws in his right 
hand. You have seen a bull enraged or a dog scratching 
the ground ; these arms would give the action ot a dog or a 
bull to this animal with a claw such as that, such expand¬ 
ing claws as you now see in this animal of South America 
in some degree. He is the Prince of sappers and miners. 
I speak it "in the presence of Mr. Brunei, the Prince of 
diggers. Mr. Brunei eyes him and says, ‘ l should like 
to employ him in my tunnel.’ 4 No/ say I, 4 he is not 
a workman for you ; he is not a tunneller ; he is a canal 
digger, if you please, so I pray you give him the first job 
you have to do ! ’ He will not go an inch below a foot and 
a half: he would dig a famous gutter ; he would drain all 
Lincolnshire in the ordinary process of digging for his 
daily food. If you could get him to march in a straight 
line in the Cambridgeshire fens, he would dig a gutter of 
incomparable utility. ... I know from experience the pain 
of digging in the position in which that animal stood to 
dig ; the construction of the human form is such that a 
position on all fours, digging with your own claws, as I 
have often done, at the bottom of caves, is a very painful 
thing, and there is a dreadful coming on of lumbago alter 
a quarter or half an hour’s work. Now, though the 
megatherium was digging from morning to night, he never 
could have tired ; he might go on for ever ; he stood on 
