THE DRAGONS OF OLD TIME— DINOSAURS. 73 



a limb-bone in the Oxford Museum, from the great Odlite formation 

 near Woodstock, which was examined by Cuvier, and pronounced 

 to have once belonged to a whale ; also a very large rib, which 

 seemed whale-Uke. In 1838 Professor Owen, when collecting 

 materials for his famous Report on the Fossil Reptiles of Great 

 Britain, inspected this remarkable limb-bone, and could not 

 match it with any bones known among the whale tribe ; and yet 

 its structure, where exposed, was Hke that of the long bone 

 (humerus) of the paddle of a whale. Later on, he abandoned 

 the idea that it once belonged to a whale, and it was thought that 

 the extinct animal in question might have been a reptile of the 

 crocodilean order. In time, a fine series of hmb-bones and 

 vertebras was added to the Oxford Museum by Professor Phillips 

 (Dr. Buckland's successor at Oxford), who pronounced them to 

 be Dinosaurian. The name " Cetiosaurus " ^ (or Whale-lizard), 

 originally given by Owen, was unfortunate, because there is really 

 nothing whale-like about it, except a certain coarse texture of 

 some of the bones. 



In 1848 Dr. Buckland announced the discovery of another 

 limb-bone (a femur), which Owen referred to Cetiosaurus ; it was 

 four feet three inches in length. Between 1868 and 1870, how- 

 ever, a considerable portion of a skeleton was discovered in the 

 same formation at Kirtlington Station, near Oxford. These 

 remains were the subject of careful examination by Professors 

 Owen and Phillips. The femur this time was five feet four inches 

 long. Their studies threw much light on the nature and habits 

 of Cetiosaurus. 



Although showing in many ways an approach to the crocodile 

 type of reptile, yet it was perceived from the nature of the limbs 

 that they were better fitted for walking on land than are those of 

 a crocodile, with its sprawling limbs. Still, Professor Owen was 

 careful to point out that the vertebrae of its long tail indicate 

 suitability as a powerful swimming organ, and concluded that the 

 ' Greek — ketion, whale ; sauros, lizard. 



