gh a long series of discovered intermediate
forms, we trace the evolution of the elephant from the mastodon. The
long supporting skin disappears, and the enormous snout becomes a
flexible trunk. Southern Asia seems to have been the province of this
final transformation, and we have remains of some of these primitive
elephants with tusks nine and a half feet long. A later species, which
wandered over Central and Southern Europe before the close of the
Tertiary, stood fifteen feet high at the shoulder, while the mammoth,
which superseded it in the days of early man, had at times tusks more
than ten feet in length.

It is interesting to reflect that this light on the evolution of one of
our most specialised mammals is due to the chance opening of the soil
in an obscure African region. It suggests to us that as geological
exploration is extended, many similar discoveries may be made. The
slenderness of the geological record is a defect that the future may
considerably modify.

From this summary review of the evolution of the Ungulates we must now
pass to an even briefer account of the evolution of the Carnivores. The
evidence is less abundant, but the characters of the Carnivores consist
so obviously of adaptations to their habits and diet that we have little
difficulty in imagining their evolution. Their early Eocene ancestors,
the Creodonts, gave rise in the Eocene to forms which we may regard as
the forerunners of the cat-family and dog-family, to which most of our
familiar Carnivores belong. Patriofelis, the "patriarchal cat," about
five or six feet in length (without the tail), curiously combines
the features of the cat and the seal-family. Cyonodon has a wolf-like
appearance, and Amphicyon rather suggests the fox. Primitive weasels,
civets, and hyaenas appear also in the Eocene. The various branches of
the Carnivore family are already roughly represented, but it is an age
of close relationships and generalised characters.

In the Miocene we find the various groups diverging still further from
each other and from the extinct stocks. Definite wolves and foxes abound
in America, and the bear, civet, and hyaena are represented in Europe,
together with vague otter-like forms. The dog-family seems to have
developed chiefly in North America. As in the case of the Ungulates,
we find many strange side-branches which flourished for a time, but are
unknown to-day. Machoerodus, usually known as "the sabre-toothed tiger,"
thoug