Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 1 (1897).djvu/119

Rh lived in the southern half of the continent. Europe stands next to America in variety and number of these reptiles, large and small."

One interesting point with these animals is their relation to the so-called "bird-tracks" of the Connecticut River sandstone, which have been a "fruitful subject of discussion for half a century or more," and Prof. Marsh considers it now evident "that a dinosaurian reptile like Anchisaurus and its near allies must have made footprints very similar to, if not identical with, the 'bird-tracks' of this horizon." No zoologist can fail to find the most absorbing interest in these gigantic and peculiar reptiles, as, for instance, Atlantosaurus immanis, of which "the femur is over 6 feet long, and this, with other portions of the skeleton, indicates an animal about 70 or 80 feet in length," or Laosaurus consors, estimated as having a height of about 4 feet, with 8 feet in length. It is considered "that the animal was bipedal in its usual locomotion on land," and when walking upright it "seems probable that the animal would touch the ground with its tail; but this is by no means certain."

We have only alluded to matters of general interest in this memoir, which is worthy of study by the zoologist, and is of the greatest importance to the evolutionist. The structural details are fully described, and eighty-five plates are given in illustration of the remains of these vanished creatures.

the present volume the first group of Indian Invertebrata included in the present series is completed." The magnitude of the work is shown by the fact that the four volumes of Moths, with the appendix to the last volume, contain descriptions of 5618 species regarded as valid, exclusive of races or subspecies.

These introductory remarks of Mr. W.T. Blanford, the editor of the series, are necessary to appreciate this colossal monograph, of which the volume under notice comprises only a fourth and concluding part. It is but a few years back when