J46 ANIMAL LIFE PAST AND PRESENT. 



the hand or wing of all the Flying Dragons being, 

 as we have already said, as much unlike that of a bird 

 as it well can be. These huge monsters flying through 

 the air must have been a marvellous sight, and they 

 afford one more instance that the wildest dreams of 

 romance have not produced creatures one whit more 

 wonderful than those which at one time had a corporeal 

 existence upon the earth. 



That the Flying Dragons were capable of sustained 

 flight, like birds and bats, seems to be beyond' reason- 

 able doubt. It is further evident that the toothed 

 forms were of carnivorous habits, and it was suggested 

 years ago, by the late Dean Buckland, that while the 

 smaller species may have subsisted on the dragon-flies 

 and other insects that are known to have lived at the 

 period when the Lithographic limestone was laid down, 

 the larger ones may have preyed on fishes, and perhaps 

 also on the small contemporaneous mammals. It is 

 difficult to suggest what kinds of animals formed the 

 food of the large toothed forms from the English chalk ; 

 but in the case of the toothless American monsters it 

 may be pretty safely said that, if they preyed on fish, 

 they must have had a capacious mouth and gullet, and 

 swallowed their prey whole, after the fashion of pelicans 

 and other fish-eating birds. 



