Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume VI.djvu/125

 DINOSAURIANS DINWIDDIE 11T like the apteryx, may still exist in the interior of these islands, they belong to a certain extent to the class of extinct genera. In a more re- cent paper in the "Proceedings of the Zoolo- gical Society," 'for April 8, 1856, Prof. Owen describes the D. elephantopus, the most ex- traordinary of all for the massive strength of the limbs and the general proportions of the breadth and bulk to the height ; and it is the opinion of Mantell that this species existed in the Middle island with the first Maori natives. From a consideration of these species, it ap- pears that those of the North island were dis- tinct from those of the South. DINOSAUR1ANS, a tribe of fossil saurians, of immense size, having many mammalian characters, such as a medullary cavity in the long bones, short, pachyderm-like feet, a sa- crum of five united vertebrae, and a lateral motion of the lower jaw. They include the iguanodon, megalosaurus, &c., herbivorous and carnivorous; they are of the mesozoic age, from the middle of the Jurassic to the middle of the cretaceous epochs. DINOTHERICM (Gr. 6eiv6^ terrible, and %<ov, beast), an extinct pachyderm of immense size, some of whose bones have been found in the middle tertiary or miocene deposits of Europe, Asia, and Australia. A few teeth were found in France during the last century and the early part of the present. In 1829 Kaup discovered at Eppelsheim, S. of Mentz, a sufficient num- ber of bones to lead him to form a new ge- nus for it. In 1836 the discovery of a cranium by Klipstein seemed to settle the position of the dinotherium among the pachyderms. This head (of which casts are very generally found cabinets) is nearly 4 ft. long, 2 ft. broad, id 1$ ft. high, its summit divided into two irts by a well marked ridge, and its occipital face wide and oblique, with a globular occip- condyle ; the nasal aperture is very large, in the elephant and mastodon, with the large suborbital foramina indicating the possession of a proboscis. The lower jaw is remarkable for its curve downward, and its two tusks point- ing in the same direction, forming a hook 3 ft. in length and describing a quarter of a circle. The primary teeth appear to have been 12, 3 on each side of each jaw, and the per- manent teeth 20, 5 on each side of each jaw ; the front 2 on each side, making 8, are pre- molars, and resemble those of the tapir ; the upper 12 teeth, the true molars, resemble those of the mastodon in their transverse ridges, but differ from them in their square form ; they are developed vertically, as in man and most mammals, while those of the elephant family are developed horizontally. If the bones of the trunk and extremities attributed to this animal really belong to it, it would have a length of 18 ft. and a height of 14, 2 ft. longer and higher than the largest mastodon discovered. The shoulder blade is like that of the mole, indicating that the fore feet were adapted for digging. It is not very easy to de- cide whether this animal was more terrestrial or aquatic in its habits. Pictet expresses the opinion that it was a herbivorous cetacean. On the contrary, Owen, Kaup, and De Blainville Dinotherium giganteum. consider it a terrestrial proboscidian, interme- diate between the mastodon and tapir. These two opinions are really not very different, since it is now generally agreed that the manati and dugong, or the herbivorous cetacea, must be removed from the order of cetaceans and placed among the pachyderms, of which last they are the embryonic type. Considering then the dinotherium to be a true pachyderm, or perhaps a connecting link between this or- der and the herbivorous cetaceans, its favorite element, air or water, may be a matter of question. It has no incisor teeth ; its inferior tusks seem admirably adapted to drawing its heavy body out of water upon the banks of rivers, and would also serve for rooting up aquatic plants, assisted by the mole-shaped fore feet. Buckland suggests that the tusks served to anchor the animal to the shore, while it slept in the water. It cannot be far from the truth to call it an aquatic pachy- derm, similar in habits to the hippopotamus. The best known species (D. giganteum, Kaup) was found at Eppelsheim, in clayey marl about 18 ft. below the surface, in connection with bones of other pachyderms ; their remains have been found only in the miocene strata. Other smaller species are described, as the D. Cumeri (Kaup), D. minutum (H. de Meyer), and D. proavum (Eichwald), in Europe ; D. Indicum (Cautley and Falconer), from the Sivalik hills ; and the D. australe (Owen), of Australia. DINWIDDIE, a S. E. county of Virginia, bounded N". by the Appomattox river, and S. W. by the Nottoway ; area, 540 sq. m. ; pop. in 1870, 30,702, of whom 17,664 were colored. It has a rolling surface and a soil well adapted to grain and tobacco. The Atlantic, Missis- sippi, and Ohio, and the Petersburg and Wei- don railroads traverse it. The chief produc- tions in 1870 were 39,869 bushels of wheat, 170,712 of Indian corn, 57,079 of oats, 1,232 tons of hay, and 844,504 Ibs. of tobacco. There