Fig. 23.—Localities where fossil vertebrates have been found in Tennessee.

1. Kingsport, Sullivan County. Mammut americanum (p. [127]). 2. Bristol, Sullivan County. Tapirus haysii (p. [209]). 3. —— Hawkins County. Mammut americanum (p. [127]). 4. Rogersville, Hawkins County. Equus leidyi, Mylohyus setiger (p. [394]). 5. Whitesburg, Hamblen County. 19 species (p. [395]). 6. Mossy Creek, Jefferson County. Mammut americanum (p. [127]). 7. Zirkel’s Cave, Jefferson County. Tapir, peccary, bear, etc., (p. [396]). 8. Dandridge, Jefferson County. Mammut americanum (p. [127]). 9. Near Knoxville, Knox County. Mammut americanum (p. [127]). 10. Lookout Mountain, Hamilton County. Equus littoralis, Mylodon? sp. indet., Tapirus sp. indet., etc., (p. [396]). 11. Elroy, VanBuren County. Megalonyx jeffersonii, etc. (p. [397]). 12. 11 miles west of Nashville. Mammut americanum (p. [127]). 13. 11 miles southeast of Nashville. Mammut americanum (p. [127]). 14. Nashville, Davidson County. Equus leidyi, E. complicatus?, Camelops? sp. indet., Mylodon harlani, Odocoileus sp. indet. (p. [399]). 15. Columbia, Maury County. Elephas sp. indet. (p. 181.) 17. Memphis, Shelby County. Megalonyx sp. indet., Castoroides ohioensis, Mammut americanum (p. 400.)

In the U. S. National Museum is a collection of remains of vertebrate animals made about 1885 by Mr. Ira Sayles, a collector for the U. S. Geological Survey, from a point about a mile north of Whitesburg, Hamblen County (fig. 23, 5). Some masses of the matrix which contained the bones accompany the collection. This matrix is a red earth such as is often found in the floor of caves and in fissures in limestone, the result of the decomposition of the calcareous rock. Some fragments are to a great extent made up of broken bones. It is evident, however, that there is now no cave at that place. Sayles suggested that the bones were “kitchen-middens” and that there had been an old fortification there. Possibly a cave or a fissure once existed there and the rock inclosing it may have dissolved away, leaving the floor.

In this collection the writer has found the following species; these were described in 1920 (Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., vol. LVIII, pp. 85–95, plates III, IV; text-figs. 1–3). Those preceded by an asterisk are extinct.

List of species.

In this list there are 19 species, of which 8 are extinct. The latter form, therefore, 42 per cent of the whole list. This ratio appears to indicate a time about the middle of the Pleistocene. There are no forms that require an earlier date and there is good reason for believing that the horses and the tapir did not exist after the last glacial stage, perhaps not after the Sangamon interglacial.

It is interesting to find in eastern Tennessee the remains of Elephas primigenius. The discovery of teeth of this animal at Beaufort, North Carolina, in eastern Tennessee, and especially in Texas, proves that the range of that species extended even farther south in the New World than it did in the old. It is not improbable that the animal withdrew to the south during one or more of the glacial stages. However, none of the other species found at Whitesburg suggests a cooler climate than now prevails there.

It is possible that some of the forms referred to existing species are really extinct. The teeth identified as those of Odocoileus virginianus are smaller than those usually found in recent individuals. The deer Sangamona fugitiva appears in a collection made at Cavetown, Maryland, and in another made at Alton, Illinois, in or beneath deposits of loess that are believed to have been laid down about the time of the Sangamon stage.

In Jefferson County mastodon remains have been found at two places, Dandridge (fig. 23, 8) and Mossy Creek. No details are known about the first case; in the case of the tooth found 3 miles south of Mossy Creek (fig. 23, 6) it is stated that it was discovered at a depth of 6 feet and beneath a white oak stump. Between the two villages, on the left bank of Dumplin Creek, 5 miles above its mouth, is Zirkel’s Cave. From this cave (fig. 23, 7) Mercer (Dept. Amer. Archæol. Univ. Penn., 1896) reported the discovery of remains of tapir (p. [395]), peccary (p. [223]), bear, and small rodents; but to what species they belonged is not known. The tapir and the peccary indicate Pleistocene times. The bear probably belonged to the same epoch.