Transcriber's Note Whole and fractional parts of numbers are displayed as 5-1/2. Text emphasis is denoted as follows: _Italic_ and =Bold=. EXTINCT MONSTERS. [Illustration: Plate XI. A GIGANTIC HORNED DINOSAUR, TRICERATOPS PRORSUS. Length about 25 feet.] EXTINCT MONSTERS. _A POPULAR ACCOUNT OF SOME OF THE LARGER FORMS OF ANCIENT ANIMAL LIFE._ BY REV. H. N. HUTCHINSON, B.A., F.G.S., AUTHOR OF "THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE EARTH," AND "THE STORY OF THE HILLS." WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY J. SMIT AND OTHERS. _FIFTH AND CHEAPER EDITION._ LONDON: CHAPMAN & HALL, LD. 1897. _All rights reserved._ "The possibilities of existence run so deeply into the extravagant that there is scarcely any conception too extraordinary for Nature to realise."--Agassiz. PREFACE BY DR. HENRY WOODWARD, F.R.S. KEEPER OF GEOLOGY, NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM. I have been requested by my friend Mr. Hutchinson, to express my opinion upon the series of drawings which have been prepared by that excellent artist of animals, Mr. Smit, for this little book entitled "Extinct Monsters." Many of the stories told in early days, of Giants and Dragons, may have originated in the discovery of the limb-bones of the Mammoth, the Rhinoceros, or other large animals, in caves, associated with heaps of broken fragments, in which latter the ignorant peasant saw in fancy the remains of the victims devoured at the monster's repasts. In Louis Figuier's _World before the Deluge_ we are favoured with several highly sensational views of extinct monsters; whilst the pen of Dr. Kinns has furnished valuable information as to the "slimy" nature of their blood! The late Mr. G. Waterhouse Hawkins (formerly a lithographic artist) was for years occupied in unauthorised restorations of various Secondary reptiles and Tertiary mammals, and about 1853 he received encouragement from Professor Owen to undertake the restorations of extinct animals which still adorn the lower grounds of the Crystal Palace at Sydenham. But the discoveries of later years have shown that the Dicynodon and Labyrinthodon, instead of being toad-like in form, were lacertilian or salamander-like reptiles, with elongated bodies and moderately long tails; that the Iguanodon did not usually stand upon "all-fours," but more frequently sat up like some huge kangaroo with short fore limbs; that the horn on its snout was really on its wrist; that the Megalosaurus, with a more slender form of skeleton, had a somewhat similar erect attitude, and the habit, perhaps, of springing upon its prey, holding it with its powerful clawed hands, and tearing it with its formidable carnivorous teeth.