PTERODACTTLE. 171 



from their operation, we infer the perfection of the wisdoKi 

 by which all this mechanism was designed, and the immen- 

 sity of the power by which it has ever been upheld. 



Cuvier asserts of the Mosasaurus that before he had seen 

 a single vertebra, or a bone of any of its extremities, he was 

 enabled to announce the character of the entire skeleton, 

 from the examination of the jaws and teeth alone, and even 

 from a single tooth. The power of doing this results from 

 those magnificent laws of co-existence, which form the basis 

 of the science of comparative anatomy, and which give the 

 highest interest to its discoveries. 



SECTION viir. 



PTERODACTYLE. 



Among the most remarkable disclosures made by the re- 

 searches of Geology, we may rank the flying reptiles, which 

 have been ranged by Cuvier under the genus Pterodactyle ; 

 a genus presenting more singular combinations of form, than 

 we find in any other creatures yet discovered amid the ruins 

 of the ancient earth. f 



The structure of these animals is so exceedingly anoma- 

 lous, that the first discovered Pterodactyle (PI. 21) was con- 

 sidered by one naturalist to be a bird, by another as a spe- 

 cies of bat, and by a third as a flying reptile. 



This extraordinary discordance of opinion respecting a 

 creature whose skeleton was almost entire, arose from the 



• See PI. 1, Figs. 42, 43, and Plates 21, 22. 



•j- Plerodactyles have hitheito been found chiefly in the quarries of litho- 

 graphic limestone of the jura formation at Aichstadt and Solenhofen; astone 

 abounding in marine remains, and also containing Libellulse, and other in- 

 sects. Tiiey have also been discovered in the lias of Lyme Regis, and in 

 oolitic slate of Stonesficld. 



