414 



MESOZOIC TIME. 



Figs. 725-728. 



in some points, it was decidedly not so* in its more fundamental char- 

 acteristics. 



Bones found in the red sandstone near Windsor, Connecticut, be- 

 longed either to another Dinosaur or to a Bird ; in either case, probably 

 to one of the track-makers. 



Fig. 725 represents, reduced, a tooth from Prince Edward's Island, 

 of a species called Bathygnathus by Leidy, which Cope observes may 



have belonged to another Dinosaur. 

 The teeth axe four inches long. 



Lacertians, Rhynchosaiirs. — Figs. 

 726, 728, represent teeth referred 

 to a species of the Triassic genus 

 Belodon. Bones, found at Phoenix- 

 ville, Pa., that were formerly referred 

 to a Pterosaur or flying-lizard, are 

 now regarded by Cope as those of 

 a Rhynchosaur, a Saurian having 

 the beaked mouth of a turtle. 



Enaliosaurs or Swimming Sau- 

 rians. — Leidy has described a spe- 

 cies of Enaliosaur (or Sea-saurian, 

 as the word signifies), from the 

 Triassic rocks of Humboldt County, 

 Nevada. 



Birds. — The evidence with regard to the existence of Birds at 

 this period has been shaken by the discovery of the three-toed reptile- 

 tracks ; and it is not impossible, as was early suspected, that all the 

 supposed bird-tracks may turn out to be Reptilian. Still, while three- 

 toed tracks have been found by thousands, the occurrence of accom- 

 panying impressions of the anterior feet is rare. It is altogether prob- 

 able that there were Birds as well as Reptiles. 



The Birds, if any existed, must have been very numerous and varied 

 in kind and size. The tracks prove, by the length of stride, that the 

 species were mostly long-legged, like the Waders and the Ostrich ; 

 and, by the regularity of stride, that they were not leaping animals. 

 None were web-footed. The existence of Birds is probable, from the 

 fact that, in the same era, there were, beyond question, species of Mam- 

 mals, the highest division of the Animal Kingdom ; and also by the 

 discovery of the bones and feathers of a Bird in the European Jurassic, 

 — possibly a cotemporary, since, as already stated, the Connecticut 

 River sandstone may be partly Jurassic. If any birds existed, it is 

 pretty certain that they had long vertebrated tails, as this was the case 

 with the Jurassic bird of Solenhofen (p. 446). 



Fig. 725, Bathygnathus borealis (X}£); 726 

 726 a, Belodon priscus ; 727, Clepsysaurus 

 Pennsylvanicus ; 728, Belodon Carolinen- 

 sis. 



