Mower County transcript. [volume] (Lansing, Minn.) 1868-1915, 1874-05-21

discovery of the fossil horses in Aneri-
ca as an evidence of the truthfulness of
the sacred writings of the Mormons.
Years ago, in discussion in England,
the representative of the M0rmons was
worsted in argument upon the point
that these writings make the blunder of
describing horses as existing in Amer
ica coeval with man, but prior to the
advent of the Spaniards. There may
be other instances in the Mormon Bible,
but the following will serve toillustrate
the point: Tho book of Esther de-
iscribes a period subsequent to the
building of the tower of Babel. It
|gives tho particulars of construction,
under divine command, of a number of
that would "hold water like dish, !"
each provided with an air-hole in the
top, covered with stopper, to be open
ed when needful for ventilation. These
remarkable vessels were loaded with
provisions a small colony embarked
upon them, and q strong wind, miracu-
lously provided, drove them across the
ocean. The voyagers were 344 days
afloat, without light or fire; but at last
they reached the promised land, where,
it is stated:
In the space of sixty-and-two years
they became exceeding rich, having all
manner of fruit and of grain, and of
silks, and of fine linen, and of gold and
OF silver, and of precious things, and
also all manner of cattle, of oxen, and
of COWS, and of sheep, and of swine,
and of goats and they
had also horses and asses, and there
were elephants, and curelons, and Gu
mons; all of which were useful unto
man, and more especially the elephants,
and curelons, and cumons.
Now there is not trace of a horse
among the antiquities of the Indian
tribes on this continent. Not legend,
not fragment to mark it's co-existence
with man, in all the mounds that have
been opened-unless the two following
incidents be accepted as evidence to
the contrary: ~ DR.. W. P. Lund was
the first discoverer of fossil bones of
the horse in South America. He found
in 1841, in cave in Brazil, among 9TH
er remains of animals, the remains of
the greater part of the skeleton of q
young horse, which he described as
Equ,ts neogc,ts, and declared to be iden-
tical with a specimen found in another
cave associated with human bones. But
Owen says, after critically reviewing
this case, that it affords no evidence of
the contemporaniety of the human and
equine r>ces in the Brazilian caves.
|(2) Prof. Marsh has in his possession q
bone picked up by an explorer among
the ruins of one of the deserted cities
of Central America it is the coronary
bone of horse; I. G., the first bone
above the hoof. There is no doubt of
the antiquity of the ruined city ; rs to
the coronary bone, thereader may form
his own judgment.
| The omission of all attempts at de-
picting the horse or any member of the
horse family on the part of the American
aborigines, if it were known to them, is
very remarkable. The earlier sculp-
lures on the Old World frequently in
troduce the horse; on the remains of
Nubian tombs and Egyptian temples
we find this animal carved. An As
syrian horse among the bas reliefs of
Ashurbanipal is not less remarkable for
the elaborate trappings of his harness
than for his own noble bearing. He is
every inch horse surely such an an
imal would have left some traces on In
dian tradition; but we read that
When the Cherokees first saw the
horse bestrode by De Soto they were as
much amazed as were the soldiers of
Fabricius when they first beheld the
elephants of Pyrrhus. Butthey named
it instantly the animal with single
finger nail Modern science has made
no better generalization than this uni
ungulus. This is the distinctive fea-
ture of tho race equally true of the
horse (Equus ca60lias), of the tame ass
(Asie,1s vuI9aris), of the wild ass "a.
0nger), still abundant in Mesopotamia,
land almost as different from tho domes.
tic species as a greyhound from poo
die, of the zebra A. ze6ra) of South
African mountains, the quagga "a.
Q,.ayga) and the peetsi, "a. burchellii, J
both also of South Africa, and of the
kiang ID. hcneionus) of Thibet. If you
claim the Transformation of species, said
Cuvier in the early days of the devel-
opment hypothesis, you must produce,
for instance, between the paleotherium
and the horse, since the former has
three toes and the horse only one, an
animal similar to each in other respects,
but having the intermediate number OF
toes. It is precisely this gage, thrown
down so confidently by Cuvier half
century ago, that the paleontologist of
to-day is prepared to take up but the
present evidence is far more extended
in its scope than that which the Father
of PalBontology deemed understandable.
There is a vast portion of the Terri
tories of Wyoming and Utah, which in
the period that geologists call the ter
tiary. contained enormous lakes. The
Oldest of these lakes remained so long
in eocene times that the mud and sand
accumulated in it by slow deposits to
more than mile in vertical thickness.
In these deposits Prof. Marsh has found
the remains of the Orohippus. This
animals skeleton resembles that of the
horse more than it does that of any
other creature of the present day; but
it was scarcely larger than fox. It's
skull was proportionally shorter than
that Of the horse, and the orbit of the
eye was not enclosed behind by a bridge
of bone. But the remarkable charac-
teristic of the Orohippus was that his
fore feet had four toes and his hind feet
three toes, all of which reached the
ground.
Above the cocene, in the order of &C.
illogical deposit, many centuries having
doubtless elapsed in its formation, the
miocene appears. A district known as
the bad lands Of Dakota, Nebraska and
Colorado, and another west of the Blue
Mountains in Eastern Oregon. contain
ed deposits of lakes that existed in the
miocene period. In the latter of these
localities Prof. Marsh has obtained the
remains of the Miohippus. Itresembles
the Orohippus in several particulars,
but it has this noteworthy peculiarity
lit had only three toes in the fore feet
as well ~ behind. All these toes reach
ed the ground, and were useful, or at
oil events, usable. There is no depres.
sion in front of the orbit of the eve.
In these miocene lake deposits anoth.
er animal is found, closely allied to the
Miohippus, but differing in having q
deep depression in the skull in front of
the orbit. Prof. Marsh has discovered
some and Prof. Leidy other species ol
this animal, which is called the Anchi-
therium. 1t had three toes on each
fore foot and three on each hind foot
but its outer toes were proportional,
smaller than those of the Mio1ippus,
The Anchitherium and Miohippus were
about the size of sheep.
Above the miocene formation is tho
) pliocene. Again ages have elapsed
In Il