Page:The red book of animal stories.djvu/13

 PREFACE

who read this book will perhaps ask whether all the stories are true? Now all the stories are not true; at least, we never meet the Phœnix now in any known part of the world. To be sure, there are other creatures, such as the Mastodon and the Pterodactyl, which are not found alive anywhere, but their bones remain, turned into stones or fossils. It is unlikely that they were changed into rocks by a witch, or by Perseus with the Gorgon's Head, in the Greek story. It must have been done in some other way. However, the bones, now stones, show that there were plenty of queer beasts that have died out. Possibly the sight of the stone beasts and birds made people believe, long ago, in such creatures as Dragons, and the water-bulls that haunt the lochs in the Highlands. One of these was seen by a shepherd about eighty years since, and an account of it was sent to Sir Walter Scott. There is also the Bunyip, a strange creature which both white and black men say that they have seen in the lakes of Australia. Then there