162 The Cretaceous Seas 



was considered large for the species." "Yes, I 

 know," I replied. But I also know of one huge 

 skeleton belonging to the University of Kansas 

 at Lawrence, that measures fifty feet in length. 

 His enormous head is five feet long, the same 

 size evidently as this one. Who knows but that 

 5,000,000 years from now his skeleton may be 

 exumed from the chalk of Kansas and exhibited 

 at the Museum of the University!" "I remem- 

 ber the mosasaurs, papa, you described in 'The 

 Life of a Fossil Hunter.' After the Tylosaurus 

 came the flat paddles Platecarpus, with its blunt 

 ram or rostrum at the end of the nose; then 

 Olidastes, a lithe creature and more elegantly 

 built than the other two." "Yes, dear, I have 

 been fortunate in the discovery of complete skel- 

 etons of these fine swimmers. I sent a very 

 beautiful skeleton of a Tylosaur to the Sencken- 

 berg Museum at Frankfurt-on-the-Main. (Fig. 

 5). Skeletons of Platecarpus to Tubingen Uni- 

 versity, as well as a Tylosaurus. And one to The 

 Museum of Toronto University, Canada, and an- 

 other to the Victoria Memorial Museum at Ot- 

 tawa, Canada. A beautiful Clidastes to Vassar 

 College, New York, a fine head and trunk to 

 Carnegie Museum, at Pittsburg, Pa. The 

 Mosasaurs, you know, all have short necks and 

 long tails. The jaws are armed with recurved 

 teeth and a set on either side in the roof of the 

 mouth near the gullet enable them to hold their 

 prey, so they could not escape if they opened 



