136 NATURAL SCIENCE. Feb.. 



aware that the powers of the anatomist— great as they undoubtedly 

 are — are not equal to the task of making anything approaching a 

 correct restoration from such materials. - 



For instance, what sort of a creature would liave been the result 

 of attempting to restore the Macrothere from the foot-bones which 

 were long supposed to be the only portions of the skeleton known, 

 although its teeth and jaws lay all the time in the national collection — 

 in a case half the length of the gallery from the one containing the 

 former ? 



This overwhelming confidence in what the anatomist could be 

 legitimately supposed to effect led to the grotesque so-called restora- 

 tions of the Iguanodon and other Secondary reptiles set up many 

 years ago at Sydenham, where, we believe, they still remain to delude 

 an unsuspecting public. Needless to say, the creatures thus modelled 

 in plaster were monsters in every sense of the word, and about as 

 unlike anything that ever existed in heaven or earth as they well 

 could be. 



Now, however, nous avons change tout cela ; and all those who know 

 anything at all about the subject are fully aware that it would be 

 idle to think of restoring any monster of a totally extinct type without 

 having, at least, its skull, the bones of both fore- and hind-limbs, and 

 some portion — the more the better — of its backbone. In this country, 

 and Europe generally, as a well-known palaeontologist once remarked, 

 we prefer (from necessity) to construct our Dinosaurs piecemeal — and 

 nice little squabbles we sometimes get into over these aforesaid 

 pieces ; and it would accordingly, with one or two exceptions, have 

 been long before we should have been justified in attempting their 

 full restoration, even if this were ever possible. Fortunately, how- 

 ever, America has stepped into the gap, and given us Dinosaur 

 skeletons by the dozen ; so abundantly, indeed, they may almost be 

 said to be a drug in the market. We have horned Dinosaurs, four- 

 legged Dinosaurs, two-legged Dinosaurs, and mail-clad Dinosaurs, 

 all and every one of which are creatures more like the phantoms of a 

 dream than any we should naturally have thought of as denizens of 

 this world of ours. 



Hitherto we have known these marvellous creatures only by 

 their skeletons ; and although these are, perhaps, fully sufficient for 

 the scientific student, yet it is quite clear that they do not arouse 

 the enthusiasm of the public, by whom they are doubtless not 

 " understanded." Now, however, thanks to our author and his 

 artist, we have them depicted in at least some semblance of their 

 original guise, the artist having taken the skeleton as his model in 

 each case, and clothed it in fiesh and skin as best he might. 



When we take into consideration the extreme difficulty of this 

 task, we cannot but think that the draughtsman has acquitted him- 



'■* We were surprised to see the other day in the Times the statement that 

 Sir R. Owen restored the Megathere from a single bone 



