THE DINOSAURS OR TERRIBLE LIZARDS. 645 



but big enough, he could give even Stegosaurus "points" in more 

 ways than one. 



Standing before the skull of Triceratops, looking him squarely in 

 the face, one notices in front of each eye a thick guard of projecting 

 bone, and while this must have interfered with vision directly ahead 

 it must have also furnished protection for the eye. So long as Tri- 

 ceratops faced an adversary he must have been practically invulner- 

 able, but as he was the largest animal of his time, upward of 25 feel 

 in length, it is probable that his combats were mainly with those of his 

 own kind and the subject of dispute some fair female upon whom tw T o 

 rival suitors had cast covetous eyes. What a sight it would have been 

 to have seen two of these big brutes in mortal combat as they charged 

 upon each other with all the impetus to be derived from ten tons of 

 infuriate flesh! We may picture to ourselves horn clashing upon horn, 

 or glancing from each bony shield until some skillful stroke or unlucky 

 slip placed one combatant at the merc}^ of the other, and he went down 

 before the blows of his adversary "as falls on Mount Alvernus a 

 thunder-smitten oak. "" 



A pair of Triceratops horns in the National Museum t tears witness 

 to such encounters, for one is broken midway between tip and base; 

 and that it was broken during life is evident from the fact that the 

 stump is healed and rounded over, while the size of the horns shows 

 that their owner reached a ripe old age. 



For, unlike man and the higher vertebrates, reptiles and fishes do 

 not have a maximum standard of size which is soon reached and rarely 

 exceeded, but continue to grow throughout life, so that the size of a 

 turtle, a crocodile, or a Dinosaur tells something of the duration of its 

 life. 



Before quitting Triceratops let us glance for a moment at its skeleton. 

 Now among other things a skeleton is the solution of a problem in 

 mechanics, and in Triceratops the head so dominates the rest of the 

 structure that one might almost imagine the skull was made first and 

 the body adjusted to it. The great head seems made not only for 

 offense and defense; the spreading frill serves for the attachment of 

 muscles to sustain the weight of the skull, while the work of the 

 muscles is made easier by the fact that the frill reaches so far back of 

 the junction of head with neck as to largely counterbalance the weight 

 of the face and jaws. When we restored the skull of this animal it 

 was found that the center of gravity lay back of the eye. Several of 

 the bones of the neck are united in one mass to furnish a firm attach- 

 ment for the muscles that support and move the skull, but as the move- 

 ments of the neck are already restricted by the overhanging frill, this 

 loss of motion is no additional disadvantage. 



To support all this weight of skull and body requires very massive 

 legs, and as the fore legs are very short, this enables Triceratops to 



