The more slender animal, which is walking towards the water, is the Anoplotherium, or un-armed beast. Its size varied from that of a hare, to that of a large dog; it had a very thick tail like that of the Kangaroo. Everything about it would lead one to suppose that it was a timid creature, whose swiftness and agility would protect it against stronger animals; not unlike in disposition to the antelope, or the hare of our times. Another animal was living at the same period, which I must describe to you, as it was, as far as we know, the largest quadruped that ever lived upon the earth, and in some respects the most remarkable. It was called the Dinotherium, or _terrible wild beast_, and you will soon know how well it deserved this name. The individual of which a part of the head is now in the British Museum, must have been eighteen feet long in the body, and proportionally large! If you compare this size with that of the largest elephant you have ever seen, you will be able to form some notion of his enormous magnitude. In his general form he somewhat resembled the Tapirs, but by no means so nearly as did the Palæotherium. He had a much longer trunk; and his shoulder blade is formed like that of the mole, by which we know that he must have used his feet in digging. It seems almost certain that he was amphibious: and the back part of his skull has a remarkable similarity to that of the whale, and cetaceous fishes in general. But the most striking peculiarity in the bones which remain of this monster, is the existence of two large tusks bending down from the lower jaw, like two hooks, as you may see represented in this cut, of the head preserved in the Museum. His legs were probably rather short, and might have borne nearly the same proportion to his body, as those of the Hippopotamus do to his. From all we can collect, this must have been his general form and appearance. [Illustration] [Illustration] There can be but little doubt that he was of a savage disposition and lead a sulky sort of life divided between the water and the land, like the Hippopotamus. His great tusks must have rendered him a formidable enemy; but as we know that he was a digging animal, it is very likely that he more frequently used them as a sort of pickaxe, to grub up such roots as he wanted to eat, for he lived wholly upon vegetables. He might also have employed them (as Dr. Buckland has conjectured), to stick into the banks of rivers to support his head above water, and to anchor himself so as not to be carried down by the stream, while his huge body lay in his favourite element: or it does not seem unlikely that he might at times have hooked them on to the lower boughs of trees, to sustain himself while he plucked down from above the fruit and foliage with his trunk. His bones have been found in various parts of France, Germany and Austria.