Page:Early Man in Britain and His Place in the Tertiary Period.djvu/85

] their antlers and horns being very small, were to be seen in the plains. One species of deer (Dicroceros elegans) was closely allied to the Muntjak (Fig. 8) of eastern Asia, and in some others the antlers were persistent throughout life. In the rivers beavers made their dams, and otters pursued their finny prey. Among the more important extinct genera (Fig. 8) then living, were two large animals resembling in habits and general appearance the elephants. One, the Deinotherium, was remarkable for two large tusks curving downwards in the lower jaw; while the other, the Mastodon, possessed tusks in both upper and lower jaws, and teeth of a much coarser pattern than those of the elephants. Rhinoceroses also, one with a very feeble horn, and the other hornless, fed on the luxuriant vegetation; and an extinct kind of gigantic ant-eater, Macrotherium, allied to the Orycteropus of southern Africa (Fig. 8), dug into the ant-hills with his powerful claws, and preyed upon the Termites. We meet also with Anchitheres for the last time. These herbivores were kept in check by numerous carnivores, of which the most important was the great sabre-toothed lion, Machairodus.

The most important animals to be noted in the mid Eocene forests of France, Switzerland, Germany, and Italy, are certain large apes, identified by Dr. Rütimeyer with the genus Hylobates, one of the more highly