THE GREAT FISH-LIZARDS. 51 



when certain important geographical and other changes took 

 place, helping to cause the extinction of many other strange forms 

 of life, as we shall see later on (see p. 147). 



They had a wide geographical range ; for their remains have 

 been discovered in Arctic regions, in Europe, India, Ceram, 

 North America, the east coast of Africa, Australia, and New 

 Zealand. 



In American deposits they are represented by certain toothless 

 forms, to which the name Sauranodon (" toothless lizard ") has 

 been given. These have been discovered by Professor Marsh, in 

 the Jurassic strata of the Rocky Mountains. They were eight or 

 nine feet long, and in every other respect resembled Ichthyosaurs. 

 As we have endeavoured to indicate in our illustration, the fish- 

 lizards flourished in seas wherein animal, and doubtless vegetable 

 life was very abundant. Any one who has collected fossils from 

 the Lias of England will have found how full it is of beautiful 

 organic remains, such as corals, mollusca, encrinites, sea-urchins, 

 and other echinoids, fishes, etc. 



The climate of this period in Europe was mild and genial, or 

 even semi-tropical. Coral reefs and coral islands varied the 

 landscape. There is just one more point of interest that ought 

 not to be omitted ; it refers to the manner in which these reptiles 

 of the Lias age met their deaths, and were thus buried up in 

 their rocky tombs. Sir Charles Lyell and other \vriters point out 

 that the individuals found in those strata must have met with 

 a sudden death and quick burial; for if their uncovered bodies 

 had been left, even for a few hours, exposed to purification 

 and the attacks of fishes at the bottom of the sea, we should 

 not now find their remains so completely preserved that often 

 scarcely a single bone has been moved from its right place. 

 What was the exact nature of this operation is at present a 

 matter of doubt. 



