4 22 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



the animal during life. This differs, in several important 

 particulars, from that given years ago by Marsh of the nearly 

 related Ceratops. The most noticeable features in the new 

 restoration are the greater depth of the body above the hips, 

 and the more digitigrade form of the feet wherein the toes turn 

 outwards. 



In 1903 Prof. Henry Fairfield Osborn described a small 

 bipedal, cursorial dinosaur, newly discovered in the Bone-cabin 

 quarry, Wyoming. At that time he was convinced that these 

 remains were those of a bird-catching dinosaur, which accord- 

 ingly he named Ornitholestes, and he supplemented his descrip- 

 tion by a lively restoration of the creature in the act of seizing 

 an Archceopteryx with its forefeet. Recent discoveries of allied 

 dinosaurian forms have caused him to re-examine these feet, 

 and as a result he now modifies his original conceptions and 

 restoration of this singular reptile. The recent discoveries 

 just alluded to were made after a searching examination of the 

 complete skeleton of an " Ornithomimine " disosaur which was 

 acquired by the American Museum of Natural History in 19 14. 

 This specimen came from Hell Creek, Montana. For more 

 than a quarter of a century the remarkably bird-like hind 

 limbs had been known, and now, at last, came the rest of the 

 skeleton. The discovery of the skull, remarks Prof. Osborn 

 (4), " occasioned one of the greatest surprises in the whole his- 

 tory of vertebrate palaeontology, because it proved that both 

 in head and limb structure this animal was non-raptorial." 

 Surprise is largely a matter of temperament ; Prof. Osborn, for 

 years past, has spared no effort to obtain the complete skeleton 

 and he had already made up his mind as to the form it would 

 present, even almost to details. Hence doubtless it was rather 

 disconcerting to find edentulous jaws, instead of serried ranks 

 of teeth. But a similar loss of teeth has occurred over and 

 over again in all sorts of animals. The fore-limbs, however, 

 most certainly are remarkable, though not more so than those 

 of Ornitholestes, and we venture to think it will be long before 

 any satisfactory interpretation of their function is arrived at. 

 At present the problem defies solution. Prof. Osborn, in his 

 Memoir, adds to his own the attempts of his colleagues to 

 portray this animal as in life, but they are none of them at 

 all convincing. But in fairness to Prof. Osborn it must be 

 stated that they are given merely as suggestions. No greater 



