Sunbury American. [volume] (Sunbury, Pa.) 1848-1879, 1852-03-13


in high ridges or processes, indicating great
crushing power and these ridges are sub
divided crosswise into nipple-like points :
whence the name imposed by Cuvcr. The
enamel of the tooth was only superficial,
forming sheet of plating over The proper
bone, and therefore il was liable to be worn
through by mastication, so that in old indi-
viduals it was often worn down TO the dem
tine.
Teeth Of the masiodon were exhibited,
and in one specimen the enamel had parted
entire from the tooth, and presented concav-
tiles below corresponding to the ridges and
points above. These specimens also were
obtained from Big Bone Lick, a saline marsh
to which the wild animals were attracted by
the salt, and probably become mred
DR.. Kaup, at Hesse Darmstandi, assured
the lecturer that the remains of the masio-
don found in Germany were much larger
than those found in North Ameican, and in
dicated an animal eighteen feet high and
twenty feet long.
the Hmalaya Mountains, which rise two 10
three thousand feet, abound with fossils, and
some of them ale of very remarkable
character. The sivatherium was almost as
large as the elephant. l, was a ruminani,
and the only one known that was furnished
with proboscis it had four horns, and in
form resembled the ghun, or the African an
,elope. As the lecturer stood by the skele-
top of its limbs.
An immense tortoise is also found there
The largest measured eighteen feet across
the carapace, and was seven feet high -
Here also were found the remains of the
mastodon, elephant, hippopotamus, horse,
rhinoceros, giraffe, boas, antelope, struhe-
ons birds, fishes, gravials, crocodies, carni
vora, and monkeys. Wherever the streams
cut through the tertiary, fossil bones are
found.
The fossilized animals of South America
were stated to be very peculiar, and, in
general have resemblance to the animals
now living in that continent, but were much
larger The gyptodon may be regarded as
gigantic armadillo it was covered with
complete coat of mail.
The catecea, the whales, and marine ami
mails of similar character do not appear in
The fossil state until the era of the terrestrial
animals. Being warm booded, vivaprous,
and breathing the air with lungs, they may
be regarded as ierrestials IN the water. The
lecturer has seen the skeletons of large
whales in Italy taken in the interior of the
country. Similar facts exist in Scotland
and other countries. The zyglodon of Ala
bama exists i'll that country in the fossil
stale, in great abundance The vertibJw are
so large as 10 resemble logs Of wood, and
are used by the negroes backlogs for
their fires.
1t is obvious that lower Alabama, which
is every where replete with marine fossils
visible all along The banks OF the rivers,
was once occupied, when it was under the
ocean, with innumerabe ce,aceans, of the
whale family, indeed, but differing from all
modern whales, and among other particulars
in the form of the tooth, which was arched
like a yoke, and hencs the name.
The quadrumana appears 10 form, in their
structure, a natural transition 10 man. They
are bru,es Notwithstanding their almost hu-
man form, and man rises infinitely above
them in his intellectual and moral power,
and in his responsibility for future life.
Man, then, is found nowhere fossil except
in the superficial deposites, aud he is found
by geology Just where he is placed BY the
history in the Genesis.