1825-1830.] 
DURIA ANTIQUIOR ,” 
1 17 
minds of his audience the reality of the subjects on which he had 
been speaking. 
In the centre of the plate, at fig. 1, is seen the mighty Ichthyosaurus, 
or the Lizard Fish—in form and structure not unlike the marine 
mammalia of the present day. The Ichthyosaurus was an air-breathing 
creature, and this is known, firstly, on account of there being an entire 
absence of that peculiar modification of the bones which support the 
gills in fish ; secondly, because there are found true bony nostrils, and 
not olfactory bags, placed in the skin, unconnected with bone, as in 
fish ; thirdly, the articulation of the ribs to the spine is similar to 
those in recent air-breathing animals. Ichthyosaurus had fins or paddles 
at its side, and a long tail', at the end of which, according to Professor 
Owen’s recent discoveries, was a vertical fleshy fin. It could do what 
no whale or grampus of the present day is capable of accomplishing, 
viz., could crawl upon the shore, and that most likely at periodical 
times, as do the seal, walrus, etc. It had an enormous eyeball, which 
was larger in proportion to the skull than the eye of any other kind 
of animal; and this eye, having no eyelids, contained delicate humours, 
which, being liable to injury in a chopping sea, were composed of 
numerous thin and (probably) flexible bones, which encased the pupil. 
Owl-like, it probably pursued its prey at dusk of evening, by moonlight, 
or at early morning. It had a formidable array of teeth, each of which 
was undermined by the germ of its successor, so that if a violent snap 
or a too vigorous captured prey broke away the old tooth, the new 
one would come up in its place. In the engraving it is represented 
as making good use of these teeth, for it has caught and is about to 
devour a Plesiosaurus (fig. 3), 
This also was a curious whale-like creature, which has aptly been 
likened to “a turtle threaded through with the body of a snake.” This 
animal was marine-aquatic in its habits ; but unlike the Ichthyosaurus, 
which was a deep-sea animal, it was a shore creature, and lived in the 
estuaries of brackish water; and there, lurking under the oar-weed 
and other marine vegetations, obtained its prey by darting out its long 
neck and seizing its prey with its sharp and formidable teeth, as is 
seen in fig. 4 (and also in the distance), where an unfortunate 
Pterodactyle has not got out of the way quickly enough, and is suffering 
for his laziness; while his frightened companions are wheeling about 
in the air overhead, like frightened seagulls when one of their comrades 
has been captured or shot. 
This Pterodactyle, or wing-fingered saurian, was a monstrous beast ( 
a true saurian, but yet with leather-like wings like a bat; the only 
