The Story of the Eocks 



131 



num. The pterodactyl's skull is prolonged into a prominent 

 beak like that of a bird, while in some instances its teeth 

 are as scarce as those of the proverbial hen. Yet others pos- 

 sessed numerous strong, sharp teeth lodged in sockets in the 

 jaw. The cavity of the skull bears a great similarity to that 

 of birds, while the sutures or lines of union of the skull 

 bones, as in the bird, have largely disappeared* The zo- 

 ologist believes this to be a case of "parallel evolution." 

 The pterodactyl had dreams of becoming a bird, but never 

 quite achieved his ambition. 



But if the attempt at 

 aviation by the true rep- 

 tile was short-lived, he 

 yet produced the great- 

 est aviators among ani- 

 mals the birds. 



In the famous Solen- 

 hofen quarries in Ger- 

 many there was discov- 

 ered on August 15, 1861, 

 the print of a single 

 feather, and a few weeks 

 later the impression of 

 the bird itself was dis- 

 covered. Archaeopteryx, 

 the primitive or ancient 

 bird, as his name signi- 

 fies, was indeed primi- 

 tive, but was distinctly 

 a bird, for he wore 

 feathers, a distinction 

 possessed by none of hi 3 

 reptilian ancestors that 

 we now know. And yet the improbability of a bird 

 hatching full-fledged out of a reptile's egg, as St. Hilaire 

 suggested, is so unlikely, that we must assume many 

 intermediate stages in avian development; stages, which 

 Mother Earth has as yet declined to reveal. While Archae 

 opteryx is a full-fledged bird so far as its feathers are 

 concerned, it shows its reptilian parentage in several ways. 

 The modern bird possesses only a few small vertebrae in 

 lieu of a fully formed tail, from which the tail feathers 

 radiate fan-like; Archaeopteryx however had a long reptilian 

 tail, with numerous vertebrae, and the feathers arranged in 

 a row on either side. It still had a full set of teeth like the 

 other early birds, Hesperornis and Ichthyornis. which were 

 discovered by Professor Marsh in 1870 in the chalk beds of 



KESTORATION OF ARCH^OPTERYX 

 From Lucas, "Animals of the Past.." 



Copy furnished by Conrad Lantern Slide 

 Company, Chicago. 



