tween the fossil and living elephants, as determined by Cuvier. In the former the laminæ of the teeth are narrower and more numerous than in the Indian elephant, which they most resemble, with the lines of enamel more slender and less festooned, and the teeth absolutely An image should appear at this position in the text.Tooth of Mammoth. and relatively wider. The tusks are larger than in most living specimens, and generally more curved, but the structure is the same. In the skull, there is much greater length and perpendicularity in the sockets for the tusks; the head is more elongated, with a greater development of occiput, and concave and nearly vertical forehead; the long alveoli must have modified the trunk, and have given the animal a different physiognomy from that of the present elephant; the antero-posterior length of the lower jaw is less, the lower molars are parallel instead of converging forward, and the jaw is truncated in front instead of having a projecting grooved symphysis. The bones of the limbs are more massive, and the usual distance between the two condyles of the femur is reduced to a narrow line. The skin is like that of the living elephant, but is covered with hair of three kinds; the longest, 12 or 15 in., is brown and like horse hair; the shorter, 9 or 10 in., is more delicate and fawn-colored; and the wool at the base of the hair, 4 or 5 in. long, is fine, smooth, fawn-colored, and a little frizzled toward the roots; there is a mane on the neck, and the whole covering is well suited for a cold climate. The mammoth has never been found living, nor have any of the existing elephants been discovered in the fossil state ; it was probably not much if at all higher than the elephants of the present epoch, but was stouter, more clumsy, and heavier. Their bones are found mingled with those of the rhinoceros, ox, antelope, horse, often with marine animals, and sometimes with fresh-water shells. They were undoubtedly overwhelmed by a comparatively recent and sudden catastrophe during some portion of the long drift period, accompanied by a depression of temperature, and probably by a subsidence of the land and an invasion of the sea, general over the northern regions of both hemispheres; during the preceding tertiary epoch there was an elevation of temperature, permitting tropical animals to go far to. the north; this temperature gradually became colder, the animals becoming adapted for it, as shown by their external covering, until they suddenly became extinct during the glacial period of the drift. From the abundance of the remains found in Siberia, it is inferred that elephants were more numerous during the diluvian epoch than at the present time. To the E. primigenius belong the Siberian fossils, and most, if not all, of those of the drift of Europe. Several species of fossil elephant have been found in North America, referred by some to the E. primigenius. Prof. H. D. Rogers ("Proceedings of the Boston Society of Natural History," vol. v., Feb. 1, 1854) drew attention to the fact that while the European mammoth is found in the drift stratum, the North American fossil elephant is imbedded in strata above the drift, of a distinctly more recent age, and was a contemporary of the mastodon giganteus, their bones being found together in the marshy alluvium of Big Bone Lick; he maintains that they lived together in the long period of surface tranquillity which succeeded the strewing of the general drift (the period of the Laurentian clays), and were overtaken and exterminated together by the same changes, partly of climate, partly of a second but more local displacement of the waters which reshifted the drift, and formed the later lake and river terraces. From figures on bones, it is beyond doubt that the mammoth lived with man in the early stone age. In the pliocene deposits of Kansas and Nebraska Dr. Hayden found bones of mastodon and elephant (E. imperator, Leidy), and a similar coexistence has been ascertained in the pliocene of Europe; the remains of this and E. Americanus have been found in Kentucky, Texas, Mexico, Spanish America, from Alaska to Georgia and the Mississippi valley, and as far west as Oregon and California. The elephants of the tertiary subHimalayan Sivalik hills have been described by Cautley and Falconer; in these the dental laminae are so separated that each forms the summit of a ridge, making a transition from elephant to mastodon, constituting the genus stecodon (Cautley and Falconer). The mammoths of the American continent are now admitted to be different species from those of Europe and Asia. For details on the mammoth, see Cuvier's articles in vol. viii. of the Annales du Museum, and in vol. i. of the Ossemens fossiles; Pictet's Traité de paleontologie, vol. i. ; vol. v. of the "Naturalist's Library," which treats of the pachyderms ; and vols. ii. and iv. of the " American Naturalist."
MAMMOTH CAVE, the largest cavern known, situated in Edmondson co., near Green river, in Kentucky, about 75 m. S. S. "W. of Louisville. Its mouth is reached by passing down a wild rocky ravine through a dense forest; it is an irregular, funnel-shaped opening, from 50 to 100 ft. in diameter at the top, with steep walls about 50 ft. high. The cave extends about nine miles, and it is said that to visit the portions already traversed requires from 150 to 200 miles of travel. This vast interior contains a succession of marvellous avenues, chambers, domes, abysses, grottoes, lakes, rivers, cataracts, &c., which for size and wonderful appearance are unsurpassed. The rocks present numerous forms and shapes of objects in the external world, while stalagmites and stalactites of gigantic size and fantastic form abound, though not so brilliant and beautiful as are found in some other caves. Chief among the objects of
