VERTEBRATE PALEONTOLOGY IN 191 1 569 



like shape of the fore-limbs, suggests that these reptiles were 

 largely aquatic in habits, although, like iguanodons, they 

 habitually assumed an upright posture. 



This wonderful skeleton was discovered in 1908 by the 

 veteran collector Mr. C. H. Sternberg. One of the illustra- 

 tions in a popular account published in the May number (191 1) 

 of the Scientific American, as well as the photograph here repro- 

 duced, show the finely tuberculated or granulated structure of 

 the external surface of the skin, whilst a second reproduces the 

 latest restoration of the entire animal. The tenuity of the skin 

 confirms the idea of the aquatic habits of these dinosaurs ; the 

 expansion of the extremity of the muzzle into an edentulous, 

 duck-like beak being likewise indicative of aquatic habits. 



To have been enabled to obtain an idea not only of the 

 structure but likewise of the colour-pattern of dinosaurian skin 

 is a most wonderful and unexpected result of palaeontological 

 investigation. 



Equal interest attaches to the preliminary account of the 

 collections made by the expedition despatched from Berlin in 

 search of dinosaurian remains from the Cretaceous strata of the 

 Tendaguru Mountains of German East Africa. According to a 

 popular article contributed by Prof. Branca to N aturwissenschaft- 

 liche Wochenschrift for April 30, 191 1, the most noteworthy feature 

 of these remains, so far as they have been examined, appears 

 to be their gigantic dimensions, which much exceed those of 

 Diplodocus. The longest rib of the latter measures, for instance, 

 i*86 m., whereas some of the African ribs are not less than 2*50 m. 

 in length. Again, the longest cervical vertebra of the former is 

 0-64. m., in contrast to which is one from Tendaguru measuring 

 no, whilst a humerus of the African dinosaur is more than 

 twice as long as the corresponding bone of Diplodocus, measuring 

 2 - io m. (6 ft. 10 in.) against 0*95 m. (3 ft. 1 in.). It must be remem- 

 bered, however, that Diplodocus is by no means the largest 

 non-African dinosaur, its thigh-bone, or femur, measuring 

 1*542 m., or 5 ft. if in., against 6 ft. 2 in. in that of the North 

 American Atlantosaurus. Still, as the femur is frequently a 

 longer bone than the humerus, the advantage is largely on the 

 side of the African reptile. The African dinosaur seems, how- 

 ever, to be rivalled in point of size by the North American 

 Brachiosaurus, in which one of the ribs measures 274 m. in 

 length, while the length of the femur is 2*03 m. and that of the 



