The highest
point in the body was above the hips; here in fact, was the center of
power and motion, because, as observed above, the tail fairly balanced
the anterior part of the body.
The restoration by Mr. Knight is drawn from a very careful model made
under my direction, in which the proportions of the animal are
precisely estimated. It is, I think, accurate--for a restoration--as
well as interesting and up-to-date. These restorations are the
"working hypotheses" of our science; they express the present state of
our knowledge, and, being subject to modification by future
discoveries, are liable to constant change.
By contrast, the second type of giant dinosaur, the _Brontosaurus_, or
"thunder saurian" of Marsh, as shown in the restoration (fig. 22), was
far more massive in structure and relatively shorter in body. Five
more or less complete skeletons are now to be seen in the Yale,
American, Carnegie, and Field Columbian museums. In 1898 we discovered
in the bluffs, about three miles west of the Bone-Cabin Quarry, the
largest of these animals which has yet been found; it was worked out
with great care and is now being restored and mounted complete in the
American Museum. The thigh-bone is enormous, measuring five feet eight
inches in length, and is relatively of greater mass than that of
_Diplodocus_. The neck, chest, hips, and tail are correspondingly
massive. The neck is relatively shorter, however, measuring eighteen
feet, while in _Diplodocus_ it measures over twenty-one feet.
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