The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1874-06-02
A MARVELLOUS MAMMOTH.

And wait its seeds above!
:, A MARVELLOUS MAMMOTH.
THE SIZE AND APPEARANCE OF THE BoNEs
| THE SPECIES OF MAMMALIA TO WHICH IT
| BELoNGs-THE MANNER OF ITS DISCOVERY
AND THE XCITsMENT.
A correspondent of the Buffalo Courier
writing from Dansville, n. Y, gives the fol.
lowing description of the recent discovery
in that vicinity of most interesting deposit
of some monster bones: The work OF search
ing for the remains of the mastodon found
near this village has been pushed forward
with great vigor aud care under the
superintendence of DIR. +. NJ. Perine. Had
those who first conducted the search exer-
cised the prudence and skill of DR.. Perine,
the fossil remains of the monster would
have been more perfectly preserved. As it
is, however, enough have already been ex-
humed to Individually prove that they be-
longed to the largest animal of the terres-
trial mammalia class ever before known or
found.
Some idea of its immense size can be
formed when it is known that one of its
tusks measures nine feet and two inches in
length, while it is eight and q quarter inches
in diameter at its base. As the large end of
this immense tusk was decayed when found,
there is no doubt that it was much longer
probably twelve feet in length. By care
fully made estimate of the probable length
of the creature, it is believed that from the
tip of the nose to the tip of the tail he
MEASURED OVER FORTY FIVE FEET,
and was from eighteen to twenty feet high.
A bushel basket full of small bones, believed,
from their position, to be the bones of one of
the animals feet, have been recovered. The
anatomical structure of these bones is singu-
larly interesting. The head of the creature
was found under the roots of pine stump.
The diameter of the stump above the surface
of the ground is between tno and three
feet. Though the pine is the slowest-
growing timber known to our American
had grown over the head of the
animal, which had probably rested there
thousands of years before the commence
ment of it's growth. Unfortunately this
stump was allowed to fall back upon the
immense tossilized head, thus crushing 1t
out of shape. A large bone which. as several
eminent surgeons have decided, is the tibia
or that part of the leg belonging below the
knee, is another proof of the immense size
OF the animal. This bone weighs % pounds,
is four feet two inches long, measuring in
diameter at the smallest part eight inches
A part Of the vertebrae and one or two rib
bones also prove the unprecedented size of
the creature.
THE MONSTER TEETH.
The most striking and interesting remains
that have been found are four or five teeth,
excelling in size, anything of the kind ever
before discovered. The lower part, or the
prongs of these teeth, show the effect of time
and decay, but the tops of them, that part
which extended above the gums, are in per-
fenf ifu1lx n1o1ad
portions of the cortex area are of light
greenish color, other parts soft, delicate
pink, while still others are a pearly white.
Z ach tooth is divided into two rows of fang
like projections resembling in some respects
the teeth of a shark. though larger, more
round and not so sharp; the tops of them
measuring from q quarter to bali
inch in diameter. They have deep inden-
lures made by the action of the jaws in
masticating food this, and other marks on
| the teeth prove the great age of the animal
when il died. These teeth were admirably
constructed for cutting twigs of trees and
other vegetable substances. There can be
no doubt that this colossal animal belonged
to that species found in many parts of the
United States as the Maximus-mastodon
Some who have examined these remains,
however, insist that they de not indicate the
mastodon "A much as they do.the fossilized
animal known in natural history as Dinoth-
erium giganteum, whose remains have been
found in tertiary strata in the south Of
France, Austria, Bavaria. and especially in
Hesse Darmstadt. These skeletons were
OF GREAT LENGTH,
some of them over twenty feet, with enorm-
Gus tusks at the anterior extremity of the
lower Jaw, which curved downwards like
those of a walrus. But as this animal lived
principally in the water, like the hippota-
mus, feeding on aquatic vegetables, it is
plain that the remains of the animal found
at Evansville do not belong to this species OF
extinct animals, as there is no body Ofwater
in that region sufficient for his existence.
This objection, however, has been answered
by the suggestion that the remains are
really those of a Dinotherium that might
have lived in and about Hemlock lake.
which Is only ten miles distant from the
place where his remains were found; that
| in one of his excursions from his
aquatic home he sought this swampy place
near Danville, which doubtless produced
food like that found on the marshy shores of
the lake, and by accident Sank in the mud
or boggy soil and died. Others believe that
| the remains are those of a megalonyx, an
| immense creature, the remains of which have
been found in the nitre caves of Virginia
and Kentucky, but the interesting descrip-
| ton of these fOssiliZed remains given by Mr..
jefferson, proves that the Dansville monster
did not belong to that class. Besides the
| teeth of the latter prove conclusively that
thew were those of the mastodon, and, as
has already been said, there is every indica-
| ton that these animals were once the natural
states. In the year 1916 the skeleton Of a