76 WATER REPTILES OF THE PAST AND PRESENT 



Der Plesiosaurus, der alte, der jubelt in Saus und Braus; 

 Der Pterodactylus selber flog jimgst betrunken nach Haus. 

 Der Iguanodon, der Liimmel, wird frecher zu jeglicher Frist; 

 Schon hat er am hellen Tage die Ichthosaura gekiisst. 



We now know that they were not the monsters of horrid mien 

 that they were once supposed to be: the largest plesiosaurs, were 

 they living today, would find unopposable foes in the vicious and 

 cruel crocodiles. They were relatively stupid and slow, cruel 

 enough to the smaller creatures, but of limited prowess. But in 

 structure and habits they are among the most remarkable, of all 

 the animals of the past or present. 



Although their remains are among the most abundant and 

 widely distributed of all fossil reptiles, the plesiosaurs as a whole 

 are less perfectly known than either the ichthyosaurs or the mosa- 

 saurs, and it has been within a comparatively few years only that 

 an approximately complete knowledge of any form has been 

 obtained. This is partly due to the fact that the order comprises 

 vastly more kinds, more species, genera, and families than does 

 any other order of marine reptiles; partly because their remains, 

 though widely distributed over the earth, and in rocks of many 

 geological epochs, are seldom found completely preserved; usually 

 specimens comprise only a few bones or single bones, and complete 

 skeletons are rare. Were there but few kinds, the many specimens 

 discovered would mutually supplement each other, finally com- 

 pleting our knowledge; but the fragments of many kinds only add 

 to our confusion. Nevertheless, because the plesiosaurs lived so 

 long in geological history, their remains are found in rocks of many 

 different kinds, and since it is improbable that any of them had 

 great specific longevity, it is very probable that all these described 

 species, or most of them, often made known from single bones, will 

 eventually be found to be distinct, and that many more will be 

 added to them. It does not seem improbable that within the next 

 forty or fifty years not less than a hundred species of plesiosaurs 

 will have been discovered in North America alone. At the present 

 time perhaps that many have been described from the whole world. 



When Blaineville gave the name Plesiosauria to the aquatic 

 reptiles described by Conybeare, Cuvier, and others, he had no 



