MEMOIKS 



OF THE 



CAENEaiE MUSEUM. 



VOL. I. ITO. 1. 



DEPLODOCUS (MARSH): ITS OSTEOLOGY, TAXONOMY, AND PROB- 

 ABLE HABITS, WITH A RESTORATION OF THE SKELETON. 



By J. B. Hatcher. 



The bringing together of a fairly representative collection of fossil vertebrates is 

 a work not only entailing the expenditure of considerable sums of money, but one 

 which also calls for no little skill, energy, and ability on the part of those to whom 

 the work is entrusted, whether they be curators, preparators, or collectors. The 

 experienced student of vertebrate fossils alone realizes how exasperating are the 

 many disappointments in his chosen branch of science. Many of these are unavoid- 

 able and will appear most unexpectedly even after he has been careful to eliminate 

 those formerly due to improper field or laboratory methods by the employment of 

 such painstaking care and improved methods of collecting and preparation as were 

 unknown to his predecessors. Where a generation ago the extinct vertebrate life of 

 America was but poorly represented in our museums by imperfect series of teeth 

 and isolated bones, we are now able to study many of these extinct animals from 

 more or less complete skeletons. For these improved conditions we are mainly 

 indebted to the late Professor Marsh, either directly by reason of the vast collec- 

 tions acquired by him, or indirectly through the improved laboratory and field 

 methods developed by him and his assistants. 



It may be fairly said that there are no duplicates in any collection of vertebrate 

 fossils, no matter how extensive such collection may be. Owing to the vicissitudes 

 to which each skeleton was subjected immediately after the death of the animal and 

 prior to the imbedding of the bones in the matrix, or to other vicissitudes attending 



