﻿208 



Cincinnati Society of Natural History. 



species did not measure over three feet from tip to tip of the wing. 

 Marsh has, however, described one species from the upper Cretaceous of 

 Kansas, which had a spread of wing of twenty-five feet, with jaws and 

 teeth like those of a crocodile, a body like a mammal, and wings like those 

 of a bat. It is difficult to imagine anything more hideous or grotesque 

 than the Pterodactyle. By the excessive elongation of the little fingers 

 of the forefeet, support was afforded to a membrane, which extended to 

 the tail, and made a wing for flying — the remaining fingers being short and 

 furnished with claws; the long slender jaws were set with a number of 

 teeth in sockets; the bones were hollow and light as in birds. They had 

 the habits of bats and wings of a similar character, and yet are properly 

 classed with the reptiles. 



The Dinotherium was a huge pachyderm, which, though its teeth were 

 discovered more than a century ago, has not yet found a resting place in 

 the classification of animals. Cuvier called it a gigantic tapir ; DeBlain- 

 ville and Pictet considered it an aquatic herbivore, resembling the Du- 

 gong ; Kaup regards it as intermediate between the Tapir and Mastodon, 

 and truly terrestial ; while Owen says it is a hoofed quadruped of prob- 

 ably aquatic habits. One of the singular features in connection with this 

 animal is the enormous down-curving tusks, which were probably used in 

 tearing up the roots of water plants needed for food — though Ansted 

 thought they might also be used as anchors to attach the animal at night 

 to the bank of the river or lake in which it dwelt. 



The Plesiosauris was first discovered in 1823 by Coneybeare and DeLa- 

 Beche. Cuvier thought " its structure the most singular, and its characters 

 the most anomalous that has been found amid the ruins of a former world." 

 To the head of a lizard (wrote Buckland) it united the teeth of a croco- 

 dile ; a neck of enormous length, (consisting of from twenty to forty ver- 

 tebrae) resembling the body of a serpent ; a trunk and tale having the 

 proportions of an ordinary quadruped, and the paddles of a whale. 



The Hesperornis was a water bird, with powerful swimming legs and 

 feet, peculiarly adapted to rapid motion through the water. The length 

 from bill to toe was about six feet. The wings were small and rudiment- 

 ary, and could have been of no service for flight. Its teeth indicate carnivor- 

 ous habits, and its food was probably fishes. 



