Dublin.
MEGATHERIUM AMERICANUM.
(Vol. vii., p. 590.)
Is not the cast of a skeleton in the British Museum, recently alluded to by A Foreign Surgeon, and which is labelled Megatherium Americanum Blume., better known to English naturalists by its more correct designation of Mylodon robustus Owen; and if so, why is the proper appellation not painted on the label? If that had been done, A Foreign Surgeon would not have fallen into the error of confounding the remains of two distinctly different animals.
Might I beg leave to add, for the information of your correspondent, that no British naturalist "of any mark or likelihood," has ever assumed that (though undoubtedly sloths) either the Mylodon, Scelidotherium, or Megatherium, were climbers. Indeed, the whole osseous structure of those animals proves that they were formed to uprend the trees that gave them sustenance. By no other hypothesis can we intelligibly account for the immense expanse of pelvis, the great bulk of hind-legs, the solid tail, the massive anterior limbs furnished with such powerful claws, and the extraordinary large spinal chord—all these the characteristic features of the Mylodon.
Whether there were palms or not at the period of the telluric formation, I cannot undertake to say; but as A Foreign Surgeon assumes that a palm is an exogenous tree (!), I am induced to suspect that his acquaintance with geology may be equally as limited as his knowledge of botany. Besides, what can he mean by speaking of a sloth "the size of a large bear?" Why, the Mylodon must have been larger than a rhinoceros or hippopotamus. The veriest tyro in natural history would see that at the first glance of the massive skeleton.
It is a painful and ungracious task to have to pen these observations, especially, too, in the case of a stranger. But "N. & Q." must not be made a channel for erroneous statements, and we "natives and to the manner born" must be allowed to know best what is in our own museums.
W. Pinkerton.
Ham.