IGUANODON 



2919 



ILIAD 



ors to adapt themselves to their surroundings 

 and escape detection (see PROTECTIVE COLORA- 

 TION). 



Its food consists almost entirely of fruit and 

 leaves, and it usually haunts the banks of 

 streams, living in hollows of trees, in which it 

 deposits its eggs. When disturbed, the iguana 

 will at once attempt to reach the water, in 

 which it swims with great speed and can re- 

 main below the surface for several minutes. 

 Although provided with webbed feet, it trusts 

 entirely to its tail when swimming, the feet 

 being held perfectly still. The flesh is highly 

 esteemed in South America and is said to rival 

 chicken in delicacy of flavor. The eggs are 

 also palatable, and are usually eaten raw. 



IGUANODON, igwahn'odon, a fossil lizard 

 found in Europe, deriving its name from the 

 similarity of its teeth to those of the iguana. 

 The species were of colossal size, some indi- 

 viduals having been thirty feet long. The 

 head was large 

 and narrow, the 

 jaws were heavy 

 and were supplied 

 with very large 

 teeth. The fore- 

 limbs, which had 

 four toes and a 

 spur and were 

 much shorter 

 than the large, ~ 

 three - toed hind 

 legs, were used 

 for grasping and a PP eared 

 holding rather than for walking. The tail was 

 long and heavy, in this respect like that of the 

 kangaroo, and it steadied the animal when 

 standing or swimming. The iguanodon lived 

 in great numbers in the swampy regions of 

 England and Belgium. The best preserved 

 specimen, which is a practically perfect skele- 

 ton, was found in Belgium, and, as mounted 

 in the British Museum, is fourteen feet high 

 and twenty-eight feet long. 



IK MARVEL, the pen name of DONALD 

 GRANT MITCHELL (which see). 



IL'IAD, regarded by many as the greatest 

 epic in the world, is ascribed to the ancient 

 Greek poet, Homer. Whether Homer wrote 

 it, or whether it is actually a folk-epic built 

 up through generation after generation and 

 given its final form by Homer; whether, in- 

 deed, there ever lived such a person as Homer 

 these questions have been studied by some 

 of the world's greatest scholars, and are still 



IGUANODON 

 As it is supposed to have 



unanswered. The quantity of literature which 

 has grown up about this one poem is enormous, 

 and still men's interest in it continues. 



The Story. The twenty-four books of the 

 Iliad deal with the Trojan War, but not with 

 all of it. The causes, the early events and 

 the final outcome of that struggle, all of which 

 must be understood if the poem is to be 

 appreciated, are treated in separate articles 

 (see list below). 



Sing me, goddess, the wrath, the wrath of Pelian 



Achilles ; 

 Ruinous wrath, which laid unnumbered woes on 



the Grecians. 



begins the poem, and the greater part is taken 

 up with a description of the wrath of the 

 great Achilles over an insult offered him by 

 Agamemnon and with the tragic results of that 

 wrath to the Greeks. In all, only about forty 

 days are covered. 



Sulking in his tent, Achilles hears with indif- 

 ference of the repeated defeats which the 

 Greeks have met because of his absence. At 

 length the Trojans, secure in the feeling that 

 Achilles hates his commander, Agamemnon, 

 worse than he despises them, prepare to set 

 fire to the Grecian camp. Patroclus, the kins- 

 man and best-loved friend of Achilles, prevails 

 upon Achilles to lend him his armor, and with 

 it proceeds to battle. His death at the hands 

 of Hector rouses Achilles, who dons a new suit 

 of armor made for him by Vulcan, and in his 

 turn meets and kills Hector. The body of the 

 brave Trojan he drags at his chariot wheels, 



HECTOR'S BODY DRAGGED BY THE CAR OF 

 ACHILLES 



but at length yields to the pleas of Priam, the 

 aged father of the hero, and gives it up. With 

 an account of the funeral rites the poem con- 

 cludes; there is no word of the wooden horse 

 by which the Greeks finally brought about 

 the destruction of the city. Throughout, the 

 gods take a prominent part, some helping the 

 Greeks, others the Trojans. 



Its Value. It is not simply that the Iliad 

 tells a fascinating story in a straightforward, 



