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History of Orange County
Mastodon
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POSITION OF THE BONES WHEN FOUND.
Having measured the giant, let us inspect, the place where found, uncover his resting place, and observe his position in death. Mr. Brewster was digging out marl, and his workmen came upon time skeleton, every bone of which they succeeded in exhuming. Though wanting some of the toes of the fore foot, we believe they were found and carried away in the pockets of some of the early visitors. Like all others in this County, these were found in a peat formation, but of very limited extent, between two slate ridges. They were six feet beneath the surface—yet so deep was the peat below the bones of the neck formed for more upright action; which caused him to carry his head higher than the elephant, and gave him a sprightly and comparatively gay appearance.— If seen together there would be observed about the same difference there is between a large horse and a large ox. The bones of the elephant’s head are more rounded than those of the mastodon. The crowns of the teeth of the former in the upper jaw are convex, and fit in the concave surfaces of those in the under jaw. The teeth of the mastodon are formed of two rows of conical prominences like cones or nipples, from which the animal receives its name, while the teeth of the elephant are more horizontal on the masticating surface.— The jaws of one had more circular motion than those of the other. These are a few of the physiological differences which mark the distinction between the animals, yet the formation of the bones and tusks show them to be nearly allied.
ORANGE COUNTY SCIENTIFIC AND PRACTICAL
AGRICULTURAL INSTITUTE, near Walden.
To Sam’l W. Eager, Esq.:—
My Dear Sir,—It is a very happy feature of the age that there is a disposition to record and embody those traditionary items of our nation’s history at such short intervals that they shall not have lost all the authenticity upon which their verity might depend. The characteristics of mature years are always manifested in childhood and adolesence, and it is likewise true that the character of the latter mark the former. If this is true also of nations, your labors are gathering up data upon which we can speculate as to the future, and not only speculate, but actually interpret with correctness the signs of the times, and be able to aid the progress of approaching blessings, or avert the destructions of threatening mischiefs. But to my business.
Enclosed you will receive a copy of a letter from Gov. Dudley to the Rev. Cotton Mather, D. O., under date of July 10, 1706. This letter is of considerable importance, because Comstock and other geologists, in reference to the bones found at Albany, refer to a letter from Cotton Mather to Dr. Woodward, 1712, as the earliest notice. When at Worcester and having, through the politeness of Mr. Haven, the secretary and librarian of the American Antiquarian Society, access to their rooms and also to the very large collection of the manuscripts of Cotton Mather deposited there, I searched for that letter to Dr. Woodward, but it was not among them. I found a letter concerning some bones of an unearthly character found at Virginia. The copy of that letter I can not now find, as it is mislaid, and I can not with certainty say to whom it was addressed, nor the date.
I also found a letter from Gov. Joseph Dudley to Cotton Mather, six years earlier than Comstock’s date. If you can weave it into your very interesting little work, of which we have had a few specimens in the Gazette, you will contribute to set to rights another item of history, as you have already done in regard to the Glebe school house. Allow me here just to state some particulars in regard to the mastodon, of which our county has been so : fruitful a fountain—in the language of correspondent—"the centre of fossils."