188 ANIMALS OF THE PAST 



ever seen." And yet he and his kindred have been 

 swept out of existence as completely as if he were naked. 

 From our west, too comes Tymnnosaurus, well-named 

 tyrant lizard, for he was absolutely the most formidable 

 creature that ever stalked the earth; a creature stand- 

 ing when erect 18 feet high, with talons fit to hold an ox, 

 and double-edged dagger-like teeth two and three inches 

 long set in a mouth with a yard wide gape. Seemingly 

 nothing living could have withstood the attack of such a 

 monster: and yet he, too, played his part and suc- 

 cumbed to the slow and insidious attacks of a changing 

 climate and gradually progressing world of life. 



Brontosaurus and Diplodocus no longer hold the 

 record for size : discoveries in Central Africa and in our 

 own western states have revealed the former existence 

 of still more gigantic reptiles, peculiar in the great 

 length of their fore legs, standing as high as a small 

 house and with a body quite as large. An idea of their 

 size may be gained from the fact that the thigh bone of 

 one of these creatures, called Brachiosaurus, was 6 feet 9 

 inches long and a rib 9. feet in length. 



Discoveries in Russia, the United States and Africa 

 have thrown much additional light on the strange rep- 

 tiles of the Permian age and increased the probability 

 that in them we have a clue to the ancestors of mammals. 



Our knowledge of the past history of birds remains 

 practically unchanged, we know a few more species; 

 one or two remarkable forms, like the giant vulture of 

 La Brea, greatest of the birds of flight, but we have no 

 new light on the origin and early variations of birds. 



One of the most interesting discoveries, partly be- 

 cause of its peculiar nature, has been that of the asphalt 

 beds at La Brea, Southern California. Here the soft, 

 sticky beds of asphalt, besprinkled with little pools of 

 water, served as a gigantic trap for unsuspecting 



