IV 



RULERS OF THE ANCIENT SEAS 



There rolling monsters armed in scaly pride, 

 Floi.nce in the billows, and dash round the tide. 

 There hvge Leviathan unwieldy moves. 

 And through the waves a living island roves. 



History shows us how in the past nation after nation 

 has arisen, increased in size and strength, extended its 

 bounds and dominion until it became the ruhng power 

 of the world, and then passed out of existence, often so 

 completely that nothing has remained save a few 

 mounds of dirt marking the graves of former cities. 

 And so has it been with the kingdoms of nature. Just 

 as Greece, Carthage, and Rome were successively the 

 rulers of the sea in the days that we call old, so, long 

 before the advent of man, the seas were ruled by succes- 

 sive races of creatures whose bones now lie scattered 

 over the beds of the ancient seas, even as the wrecks 

 of galleys lie strewn over the bed of the Mediterranean. 

 For a time the armor-clad fishes held undisputed sway; 

 then their reign was ended by the coming of the sharks, 

 who in their turn gave way to the jfish-lizards, the Ich- 

 thyosaurs and Plesiosaurs. 



These great marine reptiles are best known from 

 Europe where they seem to have abounded in the 

 ancient seas. They were long ago graphically described 

 by Buckland though, so far as size goes, they hardly 

 merit the adjective of gigantic, so liberally bestowed 

 upon them. Nevertheless they were big for reptiles 

 and some of them were real giants, fifty feet in length, 

 which is pretty good even for a dinosaur. 



Each had peculiarities of its, or rather their own, for 

 while it is convenient to speak of Ichthyosaur and 



33 



