RKPTILBS 
BIRTH OF REPTILIAN CREATURES IN THE CARBONIFEROUS PERIOD. 
,ERE in the progression of species, which has kept pace 
with earth development, we find the Devonian age, 
or age of fishes, followed by the carboniferous, or 
coal-bearing period, in which reptiles first appeared. 
At this time vegetation was very rank, bathed as it 
was by dense vapors rising from the still heated 
earth, and the growth was generally of gigantic pro¬ 
portions by reason of this very great stimulation. Save 
where upheavals had occurred, caused by the burst¬ 
ing of the world’s crust through the expansion and 
accumulation of gases generated by the fierce fires 
that raged within, the surface was everywhere either 
vast sea or morass, in which latter giant reptiles had their haunts. Of 
birds, mammals or insects there were none, because with their charac¬ 
teristics, as will be explained in appropriate divisions of this work, they 
could not have lived under conditions so unfavorable to their existence. But the 
very conditions that made other life impossible conduced to the propagation and 
stimulation of reptilian creatures, in which wise provision of nature we behold the 
special design of Providence, who in measureless wisdom adapted everything to 
the mutations of the developing masterpiece of His handiwork—the world. 
While reptiles are widely distributed, we find them most numerous in the 
tropical regions, where the conditions are more nearly like those in which they 
had their birth, though the changes through which the earth has passed pro¬ 
duced modifications noticeable not only in size, as compared with creatures 
of the carboniferous age, but their structure as well. Such changes have grad¬ 
ually taken place to accommodate all animal life to the subsidence of the seas, 
cooling of temperature and reduction of vegetation. 
CHARACTERISTICS OF REPTILES. 
Reptiles have been divided into no less than eleven distinct orders, but of 
these several classes there are certain peculiarities of organization and habits 
common to all. A simpler arrangement, sufficient for the purpose of the ordi¬ 
nary reader, is the division of reptiles into five orders, viz., Chelonia, or tor¬ 
toises; Loricata, or crocodiles; Sauria, or lizards; Ophidia, or serpents; and 
the Batrachia or frogs. These are again divisible into several sub-classes, but 
to describe them separately would only serve to destroy the interest of the reader 
without affording any practical information. 
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