304 



EXTINCT MONSTERS 



the excitement of that in which, bit by bit, and year after year, 

 one captures the elements for reconstructing the entire creature 

 of which a single tooth or fragmentary bone may have initiated 

 the quest ; in the course of which one fully realises, with more 

 or less exactitude, the picture which the laws of correlation had 

 led one to frame of an animal which may have passed out of 

 existence long ages ago." * Owen's restoration, published in the 



FIG. 113. Skeleton of a huge extinct marsupial, Diprotodon australis. 

 (Restored after Owen.) 



above paper, is shown in Fig. 113. But, in the year 1893, a 

 wonderful find was reported from Australia, which will, doubt- 

 less, in time lead palaeontologists to a complete and thorough 

 knowledge of this great and mysterious marsupial. The first 

 announcement was a brief telegram in Th& Times ; but, later on, 

 a letter appeared in The Scotsman, of September 14th, from 

 Mr. William Kinmont. In the same enterprising newspaper 



1 Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, vol. 160 (1870), p. 519. 



