FEATHERED FORMS OF OTHER DAYS. 
357 
The behavior of this fish-eating Hesperornis 
in the water must have been very much like 
that of some of our larger and living divers, 
such as the loon, or perhaps the cormorant, 
to which group of birds its general form was 
doubtless not dissimilar ; and such a contour 
has been bestowed upon it in my restoration. 
Being a capital diver and swimmer, its feet were 
placed far behind like those of the grebes or 
loons. Totally incapable of flight, its wings be- 
ing only in a rudimentary stage of develop- 
This author tells us that “ the surrounding 
circumstances were evidently very favorable 
to Hesperornis for a long period. There was 
apparently during this time an absence of 
enemies in the air above, and an abundance 
of food in the water. Hesperornis was more 
than a match for the gigantic toothless Ptero- 
dactyles , which hovered over the waters here 
in such great numbers, and the other inhab- 
itants of the air all appear to have been small. 
The ocean in which Hesperornis swam teemed 
with fishes of many kinds, and thus 
a great variety of food was at hand, 
and was obtained with little ef- 
fort. In this aquatic paradise 
Hesperornis flourished, dis- 
turbed only by the ser- 
pentine Mosasaur , 
which, even without 
tradition, we may 
ment, on the land, where it 
resorted for the purposes 
of incubation, it had no 
doubt much the action of 
the penguins, waddling 
about in a more or less 
erect attitude. In the time 
when it lived, the tops of 
the Rocky Mountains 
were but islands in the 
midst of a shallow tropical 
sea; here it was associat- 
ed, among other extinct 
birds, with two of its near 
cousins, bearing the same 
generic name, one being 
larger and one smaller 
than our subject. Doubtless they all inherited 
their reptilian character of toothed jaws, and 
were all active and unrivaled fishermen. 
In my restoration, Hesperornis has been 
clothed as my mind sees him and a study of his 
remains suggests. From beak to shoulder he 
wears a smooth skin, that perhaps was covered 
with the very finest of down, too fine to be seen 
in his portrait; this gradually became thicker 
and more evident, until it covered hisbody with 
a soft rudimentary growth of feathers, of acloser 
texture than the boots of Archceopteryx. We must 
agree with ProfessorMarsh’smostprobablesug- 
gestion that Hesperornis bore a tail of straight 
feathers rather than a naked reptilian one — 
though, could it be positively known, a realiza- 
tion of this latter idea should not surprise us. 
RESTORATION OF HESPERORNIS REGALIS. BY R. W. SHUFELDT. 
imagine, caused its banishment, if not its de- 
struction.” 
Before taking our leave of these cretaceous 
beds of the eastern slopes of the Rocky Moun- 
tains, we must at least give a passing notice to 
the most prominent contemporary of our Hes- 
perornis, ifno more than mention his name. This 
was a smaller bird, to which Professor Marsh 
has given the name of Ichthyornis victor (see 
page 358). Ichthyornis has been likened to our 
terns, gull-like birds that are found inhabiting 
our marshes or long lines of sea-shore during 
the most of the year. He was an active fisher- 
man too, and highly endowed with the power 
of flight. His fragmentary remains prove him 
to have been a bird that was decidedly reptilian 
in his skull and still lower type of backbone ; 
