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The tamandua has sometimes been called tridactyla, or the "three-toed ant-eater," because it has only three claws upon each of its fore-feet, whereas the tamanoir is provided with four. Another species of "ant-bear," differing from both in size and in many of its habits, is the "little ant-eater." This one has only two claws on each fore-foot, hence its specific name.
We have thus arrived at the Middle Eocene formation, and yet have traced back the Horses only to a three-toed stock; but these three-toed forms, no less than the Equine quadrupeds themselves, present rudiments of the two other toes which appertain to what I have termed the "average" quadruped.
Its little, innocent-looking, three-toed foot, or three and a half toed how unreptilian it looks through my pocket glass! A baby's hand is not more so. Its throbbing throat, its close-shut mouth, its jet-black eyes with a glint of gold above them only a close view of these satisfies one. Here is another remarkable transformation among the small wild folk.
If the expectation raised by the splints of the Horses that, in some ancestor of the Horses, these splints would be found to be complete digits, has been verified, we are furnished with very strong reasons for looking for a no less complete verification of the expectation that the three-toed Plagiolophus-like "avus" of the horse must have had a five-toed "atavus" at some earlier period.
The inner digit, corresponding to the great toe and thumb, was the first to go. Next number five, the little finger, was also dropped. By the end of the Eocene a three-toed genus of the horse family had appeared, as large as a sheep. The hoof of digit number three now supported most of the weight, but the slender hoofs of digits two and four were still serviceable.
Another species of congo snake is found with three toes, hence the name of three-toed congo snake is given to it. Related to the curious eyeless proteus, found in the celebrated cavern of Adelsberg, is an animal very much larger, called the necturus, inhabiting the waters of the Mississippi, and several southern lakes.
In the Miocene the stature of the ancestors of the horse increased to that of a pony. The feet were still three-toed, but the side hoofs were now mere dewclaws and scarcely touched the ground. The evolution of the family was completed in the Pliocene. The middle toe was enlarged still more, the side toes were dropped, and the palm and foot bones which supported them were reduced to splints.
It is a creature walking erect upon three-toed feet, and occasionally putting one of its five-fingered forepaws upon the ground. Not a bird, my dear Roxton not a bird." "A beast?" "No; a reptile a dinosaur. Nothing else could have left such a track. They puzzled a worthy Sussex doctor some ninety years ago; but who in the world could have hoped hoped to have seen a sight like that?"
It is a very small creature not larger than the common grey squirrel with a prehensile tail like the tamandua. The tail, however, is not entirely naked only on the under side near the point. It is not so good a walker as the three-toed kind, though more active on its feet than the tamanoir.
Fresh turkey tracks showed in places, and on the top of the longer dam, fresh made in the mud, were lion tracks as large as the crown of my hat. How sight of them made me tingle all over! Here was absolute proof of the prowling of one of the great cats. Beaver tracks were everywhere. They were rather singular looking tracks, the front feet being five-toed, and the back three-toed, and webbed.
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