OTHNIEL CHARLES MARSH 303 



1895, his long researches were compiled into a synoptic whole, 

 yet the affinities and detailed treatment of these enormous lizards 

 were reserved for the final monographs Marsh purposed to write. 

 The volume under discussion, however, serves as the only monu- 

 ment of this class of his writings extant. The work accomplished 

 on other volumes is mainly represented by numerous costly plates, 

 including restorations of principal forms. The Dinosaurs found 

 in the Triassic of the Connecticut Valley offered Marsh the needed 

 evidence that some of the so-called bird tracks, of which Yale 

 possesses a fine series, were made by carnivorous forms of these 

 terrestrial reptiles, the larger species of which were bipedal. 

 Unfortunately, much of the knowledge of this difficult group of 

 extinct reptiles was held in Marsh's remarkable memory; his notes 

 generally are not sufficiently amplified to make them available 

 to others. 



It will thus be seen that while Marsh wrote a great number of 

 what he considered preliminary papers and published three large 

 volumes, he left a vast amount of unfinished work. Although he 

 published various general articles late in his career, after 1895 ne 

 seemed to lose sight of the fact that time was passing, and that his 

 indebtedness to the Government in the way of volumes on which 

 large sums of money had been expended for illustrations was still 

 uncanceled. Habits of procrastination grew on him, and this fact 

 combined with a lack of facility in readily formulating his thoughts 

 will account for most of his literary failures. Some provision for 

 the continuation of his uncompleted work was made in the eighth 

 article of his will, which reads: 



"The sum of Thirty thousand dollars which by the Terms of 

 the First Family Trust of Mr. George Peabody, founded in 1867, 

 I am authorized to dispose of by will, I hereby give and bequeath 

 to said Corporation of Yale University in New Haven to be ex- 

 pended by the Trustees of said Peabody Museum in preparing 

 for publication and publishing the results of my explorations in 

 the West." 



After 1892 no large collections were added to the Yale series 

 until 1898, when active field-work was resumed under the direction 



