202 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



he was going to talk ! Don't tell me the people won't be fooled by 

 this ! " (A tail, four inches in length, was one of the appendages of 

 the monstrosity.) " Cox, look at that tail; take hold of it ! That tail 

 alone is worth a million ! I made a difference in the toes, because it 

 would not do to have him too perfect. The arms we made proportion- 

 ately longer than the legs, so as to resemble the ape type. We propose 

 to let the scientific men bore into him, but they must confine themselves 

 to certain parts of his body, and there we have fixed him by putting in 

 bones." 



At this time, having exhausted their funds, the worthies applied to 

 Barnum for means to bury their prodigy, who advanced $2,000 for the 

 purpose. But where to place him was the query ! Barnum declared 

 that Connecticut would not do, for to resurrect him in a State so cele- 

 brated for humbugs in the way of " basswood hams," " wooden nut- 

 megs," " fraudulent clocks," and the " Great American Show-man," 

 would at once ruin the enterprise. 



Finally Colorado, the " Wonder State," was decided upon, and the 

 stone man sent thither and buried along with a turtle and salmon trout 

 of like composition. Next one Conant visited the Rocky Mountains as 

 a geologist, and, at the proper time, discovered the image. Barnum, 

 happening (!) to be lecturing on temperance in Colorado at the time of 

 the discovery, announced that he would give $20,000 for the " find ; " 

 but., this offer, of course, was rejected with scorn. Barnum now gave 

 Prof. Taylor $100 to bore into the image and report. Hull, who had 

 heard from scientific men that boring into a true fossil would show 

 crystals, adroitly substituted crystal dust for that obtained, while the 

 professor's attention was otherwise engaged ; and all seemed to be go- 

 ing on swimmingly. Finally Prof. Marsh was again called upon for an 

 opinion, and at once detected the fraud, calling attention to the fact 

 that the image presented a rotundity of figure incompatible with the 

 theory of one who had died and become fossilized, in which case the 

 abdomen would naturally be sunken and collapsed. Remembering the 

 Cardiff hoax, this decision caused the people to fight shy of the exhibi- 

 tion. Ultimately suspicion was confirmed by the admissions of Cox, 

 Case, Babcock, and others connected with the enterprise, who, falling 

 out among themselves, at once spread the facts far and wide, in their 

 desire to injure each other; thus forever blasting all hopes of financial 

 success. 



Another would-be candidate for archaeological and pecuniary honors 

 was one William Ruddock, of Thornton, St. Clair County, Michigan, 

 who in 1876 manufactured, from water-lime, sand,, and gravel, a "petri- 

 fied man," which was claimed to have been found in the gravel-pits of 

 Pine River. Ruddock's pecuniary resources being exceedingly limited, 

 he contented himself with a figure less than four feet in height, with 

 arms folded across the breast; the model having evidently been taken 

 from an " effigy in lava," which illustrates one of J. Ross Browne's 



