FINDING THE ELEPHANT’S GREAT-GRANDFATHER
It was with great excitement and not a little pride that Perry
came racking up to the camp. He held up the Dorcas gazelle as he
approached, and even in the dusk the slender horns could be seen. As
soon as he drew near, moreover, he shouted,
“Uncle George, I’ve got an Eosiren!”
“That’s a gazelle, not an Eosiren,” said the professor, smiling. He
had been a little anxious and was unfeignedly glad to see the boy
safe, and in good spirits.
“I don’t mean this,” said the boy. “What nonsense, Uncle George! No,
but really, I did find one!”
“Did it bite?”
“Please don’t tease,” protested Perry. “Honest, I did!”
The leader of the expedition looked inquiringly at the boy’s
companion, as the latter dismounted and came up.
“He’s right, I think, Dr. Hunt,” responded Antoine, in answer to the
look. “I knew we were late and it was getting so dark that I didn’t
have much chance to examine it, but it looked to me like _Eosiren
Andrewsii_.”
“You don’t suppose it was Eotherium?” the professor asked, hopefully.
“I’m very anxious to take home to the Museum a good Eotherium. What
level was it on?”
“On this one, sir,” the younger paleontologist answered, “in the
estuarine deposit, not in the Birket-el-Qurun level. That was why I
thought immediately it must be Eosiren. There’s not much chance of
finding Eotherium as high as this level, is there?”
“Very little, I should say; almost none,” was the reply.
“Is there such an awful lot of difference, Uncle George?” the boy
asked. “That is, between this level and the one underneath. I know,
of course, the under one is the oldest, but are the fossils so
different?”
“Very different, my boy,” was the reply. “They would have to be, for
almost a million years passed between the deposits of this level and
that. The stratum of which Antoine is speaking, just above the level
of Birket-el-Qurun, is a marine limestone. This level is estuarine,
that is to say, it is a deposit of material brought down by the great
river that flowed through this valley millions of years ago, and like
most estuarine deposits, the fossils found in this stratum are of the
land as well as of the sea.
“You can understand, Perry, that in a true marine or sea deposit
you wouldn’t find land animals. It would be as foolish to look for
land animals in a marine deposit as it would be to go dredging in
the middle of the North Atlantic now for the bones of a modern
rhinoceros, or to scour the surface of the western prairies in the
hope of finding a modern whale left high and dry.”
“So mine isn’t one of the oldest,” said Perry, disappointed. “I’d
been hoping I’d found something that nobody had ever seen before.”
“You’re greedy,” his uncle said, smiling; “many an old fossil-hunter
has worked for years before finding a specimen of a species new to
science, and yet you expect to kick one up on the very first day.”
“I don’t know that I really expected to, Uncle George,” the lad
replied, “but I would like to collar a new one sometime.”
“You probably will, and meantime, in the morning we’ll hustle over
to the place of your discovery and find out what it is that you’ve
really got.”
“I hope it’s the one you want—the Eotherium!”
“If you found the bones on this level, it’s not,” rejoined the
leader, “you can make your mind easy about that. A dead Eotherium
wouldn’t work its bones up through a hundred feet of rock. But if you
want to go with us in the morning to help prepare this specimen of
yours, you’d better make a bee-line for your pillow now, for there’s
a long day’s travel to-morrow and I won’t delay the start of the
caravan for a dozen Eosirens. Sunrise for you, Perry, if you want to
come.”
“All right,” the boy replied, and being tired and backsore from the
camel-riding, he started off for the sleeping-tent and was soon fast
asleep.
He had no difficulty in waking. The sense of expectancy brought
him out of the tent even before the rim of the sun was above the
horizon, and the dawn brought vividly back to him the vigil he had
spent before the Sphinx. Early as he was, he was no more prompt than
his uncle and Antoine, and in a few minutes the party was off,
followed by a couple of laborers with shovels and one fellow carrying
plaster-of-paris, canvas, and glue.
The white handkerchief, spread out on the little cairn of stones,
made a conspicuous object, and no time was lost in reaching it. To
the trained eye of the professor, the tangled heap of bones contained
no mystery. He gave them just one glance.
“You’re right, Antoine,” was all he said, “it’s _Eosiren Andrewsii_.”
Under the scientist’s expert directions, the laborers were set at
work. Almost every movement of the shovels was watched with closest
attention, and Perry was surprised at the extreme care that was
taken. At last the bones were fully uncovered and Antoine made a
detailed drawing of the exact position in which they lay.
“How could you tell at once that it was a certain species of
Eosiren, Uncle George?” asked Perry, while Antoine was busy with his
sketch-block.
“One gets accustomed to fossils, my boy,” was the reply, “and can
tell a great many of them almost at sight. Then, Perry, any time that
you want to try and determine for yourself what fossil bones may
be, remember that there are only a certain number of animals which
they can possibly be. You know from the stratum, for example, that
the bones are not likely to be those of a creature which developed in
later times, nor of one belonging to an earlier stage of development.
You’ll see just what I mean if I say that you couldn’t find a
Pteranodon in this stratum because all the Pteranodons were dead
before this layer of rocks was laid down.
“But I thought Sirens were sea-cows, things like the manatee and
dugong,” protested the boy.
“They are,” said the scientist, “what about it?”
“This beast has got four legs.”
The professor nodded approvingly at his nephew.
“Very good, Perry,” he said, “I’m glad to see that you tell bones
so clearly. The Eosiren did have hind legs. Both the manatee of
Florida and the dugong of the Red Sea have lost their hind legs.
The Halitherium of the Oligocene Period had only a rudimentary hind
leg, so that you can see how far back in the history of Sirenian
development this Eosiren comes. But what makes him especially
interesting to us on this trip, Perry, is that he’s distantly
related to the ancestor of the elephant, and, as you know, we’re hot
on the trail of elephants.”
“I don’t see how a sea-cow can be on the road to the elephants,”
ejaculated Perry in surprise. “It looks a heap more like a seal.”
“Looks don’t count for a great deal in paleontology, my boy,” warned
the scientist. He turned to Antoine, who was putting up his pencils.
“Have you finished?”
“Yes, sir,” answered the younger man, showing his sketch to the
leader of the expedition, who scanned it closely.
“H’m, yes,” he said, “that’s about it. Now we’d better get up the
bones.”
The fragility of the Eosiren skeleton made this a more difficult task
than Perry had expected, and he inwardly blessed Antoine a dozen
times that his friend had kept him from trying to pull the bones out
of the sand by main force. First, by carefully hardening them with
glue, and then by wrapping them with canvas and plaster-of-paris
bandages, finally all the bones were got ready for removal, and,
for the time was wearing on, the party hurried back to the camp,
snatched a hasty breakfast and gave word for the caravan to start.
As they moved away, Perry and his uncle turned for a last look over
the level which had given the boy his first paleontological prize,
and the scientist drew his nephew’s attention to the ruined temple of
Qasr-el-Sagha, visible in the distance.
“That’s an easy place to remember,” said the scientist, and plunged
into the history of the temple when it stood on the very banks of
Lake Moeris and was the center of a busy Roman colony, “easy to
remember because it has given its name to the giant coney of Eocene
times. If you did a little digging here, you would find many of his
bones. Think a minute and see if you can’t guess the name.”
“‘Therium’ means beast,” said Perry, meditatively, “and the name of
the temple is Qasr-el-Sagha. Oh, I know!” he said, eagerly, “the
Saghatherium! We’ve got him at home in the Museum.”
“Exactly,” said his uncle. “Now you know where he comes from.”
“I never thought Saghatherium was just a coney,” said the boy. “I saw
a coney in the Zoo at Cairo, when you were arranging about this trip.
He was a fierce little chap, but nothing like as large as our fossil
at home.”
[Illustration:
_Courtesy of American Museum of Natural History._
AT THE TEMPLE OF QASR-EL-SAGHA.
Museum Expedition in Egypt, starting out for camp, two days’ camel
journey from water.]
[Illustration:
_Courtesy of American Museum of Natural History_.
ACROSS THE LIBYAN DESERT.
The Museum party on the sunburned stony plain. Note four pyramids in
distance, at extreme right.]
“He isn’t as large,” was the reply. “The Saghatherium was bigger, and
he was a fighter, too. Herds of them ran over this plain in Eocene
times, and with their fighting tusks, a pack of them would have been
an ugly foe to meet. Do you remember the tusks, Perry?”
“I think I do,” answered the lad truthfully, “but I’m not quite sure.
I didn’t pay much heed to them, when I was in the Museum. But I will
when I get back, you bet.”
“You needn’t go to the Zoo to see a coney,” said the professor,
squinting in the bright sunlight. “If I’m not mistaken, there’s one
off there amid the rocks. See him?” and he pointed to a crevice.
Perry shaded his eyes with his hand.
“Oh, yes,” he said, “I spot him. He’s hard to see, though, against
the rock. Looks a little like a rabbit.”
“And yet he’s more nearly related to an elephant than a rabbit,” the
professor commented. “As I was telling you, Perry, looks don’t count
for a great deal.”
Conversation dropped as the ascent became stiffer. The caravan was
going up the steep ravines which form the only way between the level
on which the ruined temple stands and the next bench, atop of the
great cliff rising four hundred feet above them. One of the baggage
camels, which had a pair of weak hind-legs, refused at first to try
to make the climb and had to be pushed from behind by all the drivers
together, while its bubbling roar filled the ravine with hideous
noise. The steep slopes also put a strain on the loads and many of
them came off.
“Seems to me these camel-drivers ought to learn to throw the diamond
hitch,” suggested Perry, as the second load fell to the ground.
His uncle looked at him quizzically.
“Did you ever throw one?” he asked.
“Never,” the lad replied.
“I thought not,” commented the leader of the expedition, “or you
wouldn’t talk so glibly about doing it over a camel’s wobbly hump.
You’ve got to have something solid, like a mule’s ribs, if you want
to tighten cinches to that extent.”
“I suppose the Arabs know best, at that,” the boy admitted. “After
all, these Egyptian chaps have been loading camels for a good many
thousand years.”
“Exactly. And besides, Perry, this climb is unusual traveling for
camels. They’re accustomed to the level or to the slopes of sand
dunes. Except for the Egyptian Survey, which discovered this bone
deposit a few years ago, probably no one has taken the trouble to
climb this cliff since the days that Lake Moeris occupied a large
part of the valley below.”
On the next tier above, Perry suddenly found a vast change in the
character of the rock and saw thousands of beautiful sea-shells in
the solid limestone scattered on every side.
Off his camel he jumped again, and filled his pockets with bits of
stone containing the shells. They were heavy to carry in the intense
heat, when every extra ounce counted, but he simply could not pass
them by.
“This must have been the bed of the sea for a long time,” said the
lad to Antoine, “this limestone deposit is so thick.”
“Yes, yes,” his friend answered. “The Mediterranean came down south
of this. Of course, the shore has changed many times.”
“What has built up all the north coast of Africa,” queried Perry,
“just the rising of the land?”
“Partly; but a great deal of it was caused by the discharge of the
mud of rivers and streams, making new land, in the same way that the
Mississippi is making new land in the Gulf of Mexico. But you see,
Perry, as fast as the new land was made, the continent sank, so that
the filling and sinking went ahead at about the same rate. Sometimes
the sea won out, and we find a layer that is marine; sometimes the
land won out, and the layer is a river or fresh-water deposit. When
we start to dig out fossils, you’ll probably find land and sea
creatures close together. That’s because when it was a shallow sea,
the marine creatures died and their bones sank to the bottom, and
when it was marsh, the land animals died in the swamp and the bones
became covered with mud. Then the sea took the upper hand again, as
the continent sank.”
“It’s beginning to look as though we were getting into the time when
the land was ahead,” remarked Perry, examining the soil.
“Yes, yes,” said Antoine, “you are right. And see!”
He pointed to the face of the escarpment, up which they were
toilsomely climbing.
“Fossil trees!” cried Perry.
“Yes, yes. All petrified. All these trees floated down that river
millions of years ago. There were floods. There will be animals
here, too, that were carried down by the floods.” He pointed to one
of the many bones that could be seen. “The crocodiles were here,” he
said, “so the bones are likely to be all separated, the dead animals
having been pulled apart when they were eaten. It will not be easy,
Perry. There must have been a sand-bar at the mouth of that old river
somewhere about here, and when the animals came drifting down with
the river gravel and sand, they were stopped and piled up at the
sand-bar.”
“Hello—” interrupted the boy, “what’s happening? It isn’t sunset yet!”
The whole caravan had halted, as if at the time of Mohammedan prayer,
and the men and boys fell on their knees. But, this time, the camels
and donkeys crowded in and the lad saw that a few small rain-pools
had been discovered. This unexpected supply of water cheered
everybody, and it was only a little more than two hours later that
the tents of the advance party came into sight. This party, carrying
supplies and the heavy tools, had gone from Cairo to Tamia by train
and hence had arrived three days earlier.
Late that evening the tents were reached and the permanent camp
pitched. It was on the widest of these ledges or tiers of rock, a
ledge varying from one to two miles wide and stretching in an almost
even line sixty to seventy miles long. The level of the Libyan desert
was six hundred feet higher still, a stiff climb.
“I don’t know how you feel about it, Antoine,” said Perry,
confidingly to his friend, as they turned in for the night, “and I
wouldn’t say so to Uncle George for the world, but I’m sure glad to
have a rest from that camel. I was just beginning to think that my
backbone never would come straight again.”
Antoine smiled sympathetically.
“I think it is the worst animal that man has ever used as a beast on
which to ride,” he admitted. “I’m stiff, too.”
“It’s the worst I ever want to ride,” rejoined the boy, and yawning,
fell asleep.
At sunrise the next day, the work of excavation was begun in earnest.
Daoud and the laborers had been eagerly awaiting the arrival of the
rest of the party, especially that of Dr. Hunt, who was known as “El
Mudir” (the governor) by all the natives. Perry was assigned the duty
of supervising the work of the laborers at one of the excavations
and he had his hands full, for the Egyptians were as excitable as
children, and at the slightest sign of a bone wanted to pull it out
in triumph. They had been working with the Art Museum explorations,
and it was difficult to explain to them that while a vase or a
statuette was a thing in itself, a bone was of special value chiefly
when its relation to other bones was clearly shown. Besides which,
Perry had received a good lesson as to the perishability of bones, in
connection with the Eosiren and this caused him to be careful.
“Hey!” he shouted suddenly to one of the men, who was walking off
with a basket of sand on his shoulder, from the top of which a small
piece of bone was protruding, “What are you doing with that?”
The tone, rather than the words, halted the man, and he stopped. But
his knowledge of English was not much greater than the few words of
Arabic that Perry had picked up in the week he had been in Egypt and
matters were at a deadlock when Daoud came along. Perry explained his
point and a brief colluquy in Arabic ensued.
“He says some one told him that we were looking for elephant bones,
and so he didn’t think a little bone like that would be any use.”
“Tell him, then, Daoud,” said the boy, “that the kind of elephants
we’re looking for were sometimes as small as cats.”
Even Daoud’s impassive face could not hide the fact that he thought
this a fib—as it was undoubtedly a gross exaggeration, but he
translated it as bidden.
Immediately the laborer put down his basket, and taking out the small
bone, handed it dramatically to Perry, saying in Arabic:
“Elephant!”
Everybody laughed and the excavation proceeded, but the fellaheen
had learned the importance of every bone, no matter how tiny, and
several small but important finds were made. The amount of sand to
be removed, however, proved greater than Dr. Hunt had anticipated,
and it was with great pleasure that the expedition saw the arrival
of a party of twelve men from Kuft, coming to ask for work. They had
walked the two days’ distance into the waterless desert, and it was
evident, as soon as they arrived, that they were already regretting
the loss of the cooler and more grateful valley of the Nile. Also,
they speedily saw that the distance of the camp from the base of
supplies might mean scanty rations.
“I’m glad to have those extra men,” remarked the professor at dinner
that evening.
“Are you?” queried Wyr pointedly.
The scientist looked at him inquiringly.
“Why not?”
“I rather fancy there’s trouble ahead,” he answered. “They didn’t
come up in the sort of way those beggars usually do when they’re
looking for work. They may be all right, you know, but, personally, I
thought them a bally discontented-looking lot.”
The truth of this guess was apparent less than half an hour later.
Daoud, accompanied by the leader of the twelve men from Kuft, came to
the tent and asked to see El Mudir. He made a demand of ten piastres
(fifty cents) a day, or all the men would quit work immediately. The
professor heard them and sent them away without an answer.
“You know I can’t pay it,” he said to the members of the party, after
the natives had gone. “If I do, it’ll upset the labor market along
the Nile, everywhere, and every government party will have to pay
that price forever after. I suppose I can give them a little more
than the average, because this work is on the desert and a long way
from everything. What do you think, Mr. Wyr?”
“I’ll try to handle them, if you like,” was the reply.
“Only too glad,” said the professor, and the leaders of the natives
were sent for.
Perry, of course, could not understand a word, but, knowing the
subject under discussion, he was able to follow a good deal of that
long conference. It lasted for three hours under the black and
starlit sky of Egypt, a battle between capital and labor, out in
the naked desert, a day’s journey away from water. Inside the tent,
reading by the light of one candle, the professor sat, in full view
of the native bargainers, immovable. At last the men began to waver,
and with a look of satisfaction as he turned to the members of the
expedition, but which the contestants did not see, the Egyptian
Government expert announced that the laborers had agreed to accept a
contract of eight piastres a day, with the promise of a holiday once
a fortnight at which there should be given a present of a fat-tailed
sheep.
The professor was a man with a great deal of dignity and presence,
but this was equaled by the gravity and poise of the leader of the
laborers, Ibrahim Salim. When at last the agreement was made, the
Arab drew a seal from the inner folds of his robe and signed a
contract for his laborer gang with an air that suggested the signing
of a treaty to decide the destinies of nations.
With this added number of laborers, the work of excavation went
more rapidly, and prizes began to appear. On the tenth day, in the
pit which was supervised by the professor, an excellent skull of a
young Arsinotherium was found, a curious creature with four horns,
two of them huge, and which, as Perry was told, is a puzzle to
paleontologists, for it was the lord of its age in Egypt and yet its
ancestry is quite unknown. Four days later Antoine had the honor of
unearthing the first skull of a paleo-mastodon discovered by the
expedition.
It was at the very close of the next day’s work that Perry,
overseeing the work of the men in the pit to which he had been
assigned, saw part of a skull exposed. He called away the workmen to
another corner of the pit, for he knew that only two or three minutes
of the working day remained. No sooner were they gone than he jumped
into the pit himself and began to scoop away the sand with his hands.
Gradually the particles of sand began to fall away, little by little
the white gleam of bone became more and more apparent, and a skull,
such as the boy had never seen in his life before, seemed to stare
through its eyeholes at him out of the reddish sand and gravel that
had been the sand bar of that ancient river millions of years before.
What could the strange skull be?
Only the day before, when Antoine had found the paleo-mastodon, Dr.
Hunt had said:
“If only we could find a Moeritherium, now!”
Could this be the Moeritherium?
Summoning to his help every scrap of his knowledge, Perry scanned
the skull eagerly for something that would seem to remind him of an
elephant. If only there had been tusks! But there were only two large
cutting teeth. Still, no one yet in the expedition had found a skull
like the one before him and his hopes for a Moeritherium would not
down.
“Uncle George!” he cried, “can you come here a minute?”
The ring in his voice suggested a discovery, and the professor
hurried over. In the evening light he cast a look at the protruding
skull and leaped down in the pit to make sure. Then, suddenly, he
cried:
“It is a Moeritherium! By the powers, Perry, you’re the luck boy of
this expedition!”