PTERODACTYLS. 



PTERODACTYLS. 



M 



BluBeobach took a widely different view of the .ubject, and referred 

 thie extraordinary form to the Palmipede or Web-Footed Bird* 



Prof stem Hermann of Straaburg, who drew upon hi* imagination 

 for a restoration of the animal, and clothed it in a hairy "kin, con- 

 Mdered H to be a Mammal, and assigned to it a situation between 

 the mammiferous claat and birds *tUl more intermediate than that 

 occupied by the bate. 



At the tame time theae flying reptile* a denomination almost contra- 

 dictory hare a long neck, the bill of a bird, everything in short that 



hove been described. 



could conduce to give them a strange aspect. (' On. FOB*.') 



About 20 species of the genus Pttrwlaetylu* I 

 The following are some of those best known : 



1. P. Imyirottrit, Cuv. (OrnithocepMtu lonyiroilrit, Somm. ; P. cro- 



rteroJactylut loiifiralrit. 



Summering also arranged the form among the mammals, in the 

 neighbourhood of the bate, not without an elaborate detail of the 

 reasons which had conducted him to that conclusion. 



It was reserved for the penetrating eye and acute but patient inves- 

 tigation of Cnvier effectually to destroy these theories, supported 

 though they were by weighty authorities : the satisfactory reasoning 

 by which he disposes of them one after the other, and proves con- 

 clusively from the organisation of the animal that it was a Saurian (in 

 which opinion he was supported by Oken), will be found at large in 

 the fifth volume of the last edition of his ' Ossemens Fossiles.' Our 

 limiU will not permit us to detail the links of the harmonious chain 

 of his proofs; and we must here content ourselves with observing 

 that the form of the os quadrature appears to have been the principal 

 key by which the great French naturalist solved this intricate zoological 

 punle, and detected ite Saurian character. " Behold," says he, after 

 having built, as it were, the animal before our eyes, " an animal which, 

 in ite osteology, from ite teeth to the end of ite claw*, offers all the 

 characters of the Saurians ; nor can we doubt that those characters 

 existed in ite integument* and soft parte-in its scale*, ite circulation, 

 Ms generative organs. But it was at the same time an animal provided 

 with the means of flight which, when stationary, could not have 

 made much use of ite anterior extremities, even fr it did not keep 

 them always folded as birds keep their wings, which nevertheless 

 might me ite small anterior fingers to suspend iteelf from the branches 

 f trees, but whro at rest must have been ordinarily on ite hind feet, 

 like the birds again ; and, also like them, must have carried ite neck 

 uberect and carved backwards, so that ite enormous head should not 

 interrupt ite equilibrium." 



WU may Cuvier remark, that of all the beings whose ancient exist- 

 root is revealed to us in his great work above alluded to, these 

 Pterodactyl** are the mo*t extraordinary ; and that if we could see 

 them alive, they would be tho most at variance with living forms. 

 Their flight was not performed by means of ribs as in the dragons 

 [DBACOXIXA] ; nor by means of a wing without dirtinct fingers, like 

 that of a bird ; nor by a wing leaving tho thumb alone at liberty, as 

 in the bate ; but by a wing sustained principally on one very elongated 

 finger, whilst the rest preserved their ordinary brevity and their claws. 



codilocephaloldcs, Ritgen). About the size of a woodcock. It is found 

 in Solenhofen. 



2. P. brcviroitrit, Cuv. (0. brcvirottrii, Somm. ; P. netttctphaloidt* 

 Ritgen). Found in Solenhofen. 



fteroijarlylul Ifcriroltrtt. 



3. /'. crauiroilrit, Qoldf. Found in Solenhofen. 



4. /'. audio*, Munator. Solenhofen. 

 6. P. Miiruteri, Ooldf. Solenhofen. 



6. P. macronyx, Buckland (0. Banthmtii, Theodori). Size nbout 

 tLat of a raven ; wings, when expanded, about four feet from tip to tip. 

 Found at Lyme Regis (Buckland) ; Banz, Germany (H. Von Meyer). 



7. P. gi-andii, Cuv. (0. yiganieut, Somm.). About four times as 

 large as P. longimtrit. Found at Solenhofen (?). 



5. P. Sutllandii, Qoldf. Stones&eld. 



