ON THE HABITS AND THE POSE OF THE SAU- 

 BOPODOUS DINOSAURS, ESPECIALLY 

 OF DIPLODOCUS 



DR. OLIVER P. HAY 



Washington D. C. 



To most persons the habits of living animals are more 

 interesting than is their anatomy. The same is probably 

 even more true with respect to the extinct animals. How- 

 ever, when it comes to determining the habits of extinct 

 animals, their aquatic or terrestrial habitat, their modes 

 of progression, their bearing on their limbs, their food 

 and their ways of procuring it, their modes of attack and 

 defense against their enemies, their manner of reproduc- 

 tion, etc., we meet with many difficulties. 



The Sauropoda, and especially the species of Diplo- 

 docus, offer a fine illustration of the difficulties men- 

 tioned. Were they aquatic, or terrestrial, or amphib- 

 ious? Did they affect dry lands, or swamps, or rivers 

 and lakes? Did they eat vegetable food or did they prey 

 on other animals? Did they chew their food or did they 

 bolt it? Did they bring forth living young or did they 

 lay immense eggs? Did they make bold attacks on their 

 enemies or were they timid and cowardly creatures? 

 Did they walk only, or swim only, or did they employ 

 both methods of transporting their huge bodies? If 

 they walked, was it on all four legs or on the hinder ones 

 only? If on all four, did they carry their bodies high 

 above the ground, after the manner of the ox and the 

 horse, or did they carry them low down, like the croco- 

 diles, perhaps dragging their bellies on the ground? 



To some of these questions more or less definite 

 answers have been made and accepted; others remain 

 unanswered. It is pretty well agreed that a part of their 

 time was passed in the water; that they could swim 

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