A Sportsman 397 



climatic changes have occurred in this region and 

 north beyond. 



At one time the Atlantic Ocean extended to the 

 base of the Rocky Mountains, as clearly indicated by 

 the immense deposits of sea-shells and petrified marine 

 animals now found at the base of the mountains. 



The predecessors of the whales, black-fish, grampus, 

 porpoises, and other warm-blooded animals of the 

 sea, were here once in active life in prehistoric times, 

 of which unmistakable evidence is found. At the 

 time of the semitropical climate, when all the land from 

 the present Atlantic Coast to the Rocky Mountains 

 excepting a few hundred feet of Mount Washing- 

 ton in New Hampshire was submerged, and prob- 

 ably long before man had appeared in any form 

 similar to that of the present, the saurian family 

 existed in great variety, of which the ichthyosaurian 

 remains found from California to Wyoming indicate 

 the immense profusion of this class in variety. 



The remains of this immense animal, showing a 

 frame as large as that of our modern whale, are com- 

 paratively plentiful in Colorado and Wyoming, from 

 which I have seen and secured petrified fragmentary 

 specimens. These immense saurians were more or 

 less amphibious, and may clearly be designated to 

 have been the whales of the Triassic and Jurassic 

 periods, showing in their anatomy the bones of the 

 fingers, feet and arms, and joints as exhibited to-day 

 in the flippers of the whale. These indicate an adapt- 

 ability for land life, once experienced in the history 

 of this largest animal of creation, representative of 

 myriads of aquatic reptiles dwelling upon land. 

 The recent discoveries in Italy, California, Nevada, 



