canine tooth only, and was brought up from a depth of 160 feet during the making of a well at Camberwell. More abundant remains have since been found in North America.
This genus had a large head, and in some specimens traces of the "horn cores," so marked in the related Dinoceras, are to be noticed. The skull is broad behind and narrowed in front; the roofing bones show the cellular spaces so characteristic of the Elephant. The jugal bone, however, is not, as it is in the Elephant, placed in the middle of the somewhat massive zygomatic arch. As in some other primitive Ungulates (e.g. Phenacodus) there are twenty dorso-lumbar vertebrae, of which fifteen bore ribs.
The scapula seems to have possessed a peculiar leaf-like form, swelling in the middle and ending almost in a point above. It has a well-marked spine, and the acromion projects much. The fore- as well as the hind-feet are in a state of transition between plantigradism and digitigradism. It was at one time held that the animal was digitigrade as to the fore-feet and plantigrade as to the hind-feet. Though, as has been pointed out, it is a fact that the hind-feet are often on a different plane of evolution from the fore-feet, it seems that this amount of difference does not characterise any Ungulate, not excepting the genus now under consideration.
The toes are very spreading. The pelvic girdle is of great strength and broadness. The femur, as in the Perissodactyles, has a well-developed third trochanter; but whereas in this particular the hind-limb is Perissodactyle, it is Artiodactyle in the fact that the tibia and the fibula articulate with the astragalus and calcaneum. The ridged teeth have given the name to the genus.
A curious feature in the structure of the genus are the slender spines of the dorsal vertebrae, which contrast with the enormous ones of some other Ungulates—more curious in this genus, which is of heavy build, than in the lighter Pantolambda. The back of the animal is short, and the limbs are very spreading, so that the gait was doubtless shuffling. The large head, and short and heavy limbs and limb girdles added probably to its cumbrous walk or trot. The canines are great tusks, and spread out on both sides of the mouth.[1]
The late Professor Cope, in 1874, described the probable appearance of the Coryphodon in the following words:—"The general appearance of the Coryphodons, as determined by the skeleton
- ↑ Osborn, Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist. x. 1898, p. 81.
