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THE AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM MAGAZINE. 



Cast of the skull and lower jaw of Tyrannosaurus. Prepared at the 

 American Museum of Natural History. 



[Photo.— G. C. Glutton. 



saurus was not a subtle hunter, like the 

 eat or the fox, but depended on brute 

 strength and mass action to provide 

 him with a meal. This gigantic reptile, 

 the largest flesh-eating animal that 

 ever walked the earth, lived in the 

 Cretaceous times and was the culmi- 

 nating effort of evolution in this par- 

 ticular direction. It probably preyed 

 on the giant herbivorous dinosaurs 

 of the same period, which were mainly 

 slow-moving, dull-witted creatures. 



BEAKED DINOSAURS. 



The huge amphibious dinosaurs had 

 already passed away before Tyranno- 

 saurus appeared, but there were other 

 huge vegetable -feeding reptiles, the 

 Beaked Dinosaurs or Predentata, which 

 flourished contemporaneously with 

 Tyrranosaurus. One of these was Tri- 

 ceratops, a clumsy strongly built rep- 

 tile somewhat resembling a rhinoceros 

 in size and appearance. It had a huge 

 head, three strong horns, and a great 

 bony crest or frill projecting from the 

 back of its skull over its neck. The 

 animal was quadrupedal, with short 

 massive legs, terminating in hoofs, a 



short thick tail, a stout body, and a 

 short neck. Its muzzle was encased 

 in a horny beak lesembling that of a 

 turtle, and its teeth had broad crowns, 

 indicating that it chewed its food, 

 instead of swallowing it whole as modern 

 birds and reptiles do. Even Tyranno- 

 saurus would find no mean antagonist 

 in this ponderous reptile, for the latter 

 was practically its equal in bulk, and, 

 with its great horns, which sometimes 

 reached a length of almost three feet, 

 and its armour-plated neck, it was well 

 designed to withstand the rushing 

 onset of the great carnivore. It is 

 probable that there was many a battle 

 royal between these two formidable 

 antagonists in the distant geologic 

 past, when these dragons of the prime 

 stalked the earth in their might. The 

 accompanying photograph, reproduced 

 from a drawing by Charles R. Knight, 

 depicts the preliminaries of such a 

 combat. The Triceratops, male and 

 female no doubt, are waiting with low- 

 ered head, prepared to give battle to 

 the advancing Tyrannosaur, while their 

 young one seeks safety by pushing close 

 to its bulky parent. 



