Like the elephant they have five short toes on each foot, probably
buried in life in a large soft pad, but the inner digits bear large
claws, blunt like those of turtles, one in the fore foot, three in the
hind foot.
To this group belong the Brontosaurus and Diplodocus, the
Camarasaurus, Morosaurus and other less known kinds. All of them lived
during the late Jurassic and Comanchic ("Lower Cretaceous") and belong
to the older of the two principal Dinosaur faunas. They were
contemporaries of the Allosaurus and Megalosaurus, the Stegosaurus and
Iguanodon, but unlike the Carnivorous and Beaked Dinosaurs they
became wholly extinct before the Upper or true Cretacic, and left no
relatives to take part in the final epoch of expansion and prosperity
of the dinosaurian race at the close of the Reptilian era.
[Illustration: Fig. 20.--Skeletons of _Brontosaurus_ (above) and
_Diplodocus_ (below) in the American Museum. The parts preserved
in these specimens are shaded. Scale, 10 feet=1 inch.]
BRONTOSAURUS.
The following description of the Brontosaurus skeleton in the American
Museum was first published in the American Museum Journal of April,
1905:[11]
"The Brontosaurus skeleton, the principal feature of the hall, is
sixty-six feet eight inches long. (The weight of the animal when alive
is estimated by W.K. Gregory at 38 tons). About one-third of the
skeleton including the skull is restored in plaster modelled or cast
from other incomplete skeletons.
Pages:
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54