LARAMIE, OR TRANSITION EPOCH. 



499 



have already said, the Dinosaurs still continued to linger, but under 

 rapidly changing conditions, and ready to disappear. And here, again, 

 as in the case of Ammonites (p. 480), we observe that the last survivors 

 take on strange and grotesque forms. In this class, also, as in the case 

 of Ammonites, the wave of evolution crested and broke into strange 

 forms at the moment of its dissolution. The most remarkable of all 

 Dinosaurs were the different species of Triceratops (three-horned face, 

 Fig. 838). This genus was characterized by the possession of two 



Pig. 838.— Triceratops flabellatns, x -^ (after Marsh), a. nasal opening ; b, orbit ; h. frontal horn- 

 core ; h\ nasal horn-core ; e, occipital crest ; p, pre-dentary bone ; r, rostral bone. 



enormous horns, three feet long and ten inches in diameter on the 

 frontal bones, and one of smaller size on the nose ; and by a large oc- 



Fig. 839.— Diclonius mirabilis. x T \ (after Cope). 



cipital crest projecting backward and outward and curving downward, 

 and fringed around with short horns somewhat in the manner of the 

 horned lizard (Phrynosoma). The end of the snout also was toothless, 

 and covered with horn forming a beak. A head of one of these has 

 been found more than six feet long and four feet wide, and another 



