Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-11-01

of the human race intermediate between tn
apes and the present generation. Th
history of the world is story of continuou
retreat of the waters from the land-river
drying up, lakes becoming shallower, ant
seas receding from the continents.
Let it be supposed that 500, 900 years agt
tribes of the Missing Links lived upon thu
earth. Necessarily, very near all Of then
in dying would disappear. Not even theil
bones would be left. But some few would
be drowned in the lakes, or their bodies fall
! ing into the steams would be swept into the
| larger areas of water, becoming on occa-
eions entombed in the mud at their bottoms.
In the course of time, the water having
gone away, that mud is transformed into
rock. It appears as dry land, and then for
the first time the fossiLhunter comes along
and makes his discoveries.
IT WILL BE AROUND SOMETIME.
Thus it will happen within q few cent
uries at the farthest that missing links will
be dug out from more places than one, the
vanished waters having disclosed the rest
ing places of their remains, and thereby
will be established in its entirety the chain
which connects that most wonderful of ami.
mails man with the bit of primordial pro-
toplasm from which he is sprung.
One of the mos remarkable discoveries of
fossils ever made Is newly announced by
Prof Cope. 1t is great deposit of bones
Of extinct birds about small lake in the
sage-brush desert of Central Oregon. Now,
bird fossils are very hard to find, because
their bones are so light and fragile
as to become easily scattered, and
water, instead of sinking and becoming
buried in the mud, SO that they were COB
bled up and digested by alligators and
various other swimming animals of carniv-
orous inclination. But presumably be-
cause conditions were more favorable than
usual to their preservation, the bones Of
the waterfowl and other feathered creatures
which formerly lived about this Fossil
Lake, as it is called, have been kept intact
for centuries upon centuries, SO that to-day
there exists in that place the most wonder
full mine OF such treasures that is known in
the world.
EVIDENCE OF CLIMATIC CHANGE
The bones are found under very unusual
conditions-namely scattered among the
shifting sands about the shores of the lake,
instead of being contained in o matrix of
solid rock. A large part of them are quite
as perfect as when the fowls to which they
belonged died and left them behind. Their
bodies became buried in the sandy bottom,
where the receding water has left them high
and dry. However, there are several inter.
esting points about the remains apart from
the mere antiquity of the species they
represent, many If which are new to the
ornitholosist They prove that, in the time
when these birds lived, that region, now SO
cold comparatively, was tropical Among
the species we're f1amingoee.
Also, mixed with the bones, are dug up
arrow and spearheads Clipped out of VOL
canic glass by human beings The great
abundance of these weapons suggests that
thev must have been shot at the game, both
winged and otherwise, which in former
times frequented the lake. No such things
are found in the soil in the surrounding re-
gion. Therefore, the query offers itself,
how long ago did man fnhabit that part of
the country? Was he eotemporary with
these auc: mt birds and with the numerous
extinct mammals whose remains are discov-
cred about the waters edge?
CAMELs AND zEBRAs IN OREGON.
1t was a strange collection of creatures
that once gathered about this small lake in
Oregon, as the bones they have left behind
them show. There were herds OF horses
which resembled zebras and guaggas, though
whether they we're striped or otherwise col
ored nobody can tell Four species of
camels there were. some as big as the larg-
est which exist to-day, while the smallest
we're about the size of Virginia deer.
Whether they had humps or not il is i'm
possible to know. In those times the whole
country from New Jersey to Florida, and as
far west as California was over-run with
camela The farther back one gets in their
history by digging for their fossils the
smaller they seem to have been, just as was
the case with the horse, which was no bigger
than fox originally.
The "bone yard," as the shores Of Fossil
Lake are locally called, was originally dis
covered by cattlemen who were looking up
stock which had wandered into this uuinvit-
ing region. Their attention was excited by
the multitude of skeletons which were dis.
tributed around, and they carried off many
Of the best specimens Subsequent explo-
rations by Professor Condor, of the Uni
versity Of Oregon, and Professor Cope, have
produced remains of several varieties of
llamas, mammoths, giant sloths as big as
oxen, and ever SO many other astonishing
curiositiek
WALLED CLUB-Fo0T FASHION.
This great sloth, like the megatherium,
which was as big as two elephants, and
others of it's kind, Numbered along with its
uiuu lccI tuFuCu luWdfu, CiuU.lOOb I6SuiOu,
this structure being designed by nature to
aid it in clinging to the branches of trees,
pn the foliage of which it fed, pulling them
up by the roo. when it was desirable. When
its species lived in the Oregon desert, that
section of the country was presumably q
tropical garden, abloom with luxuriant
Besides the beasts mentioned,
The bone deposits show that there existed
on the spot many extinct dogs, otters,
beavers, photographers and meadow mice
Of birds there were, in addition to the fla
mingoes, herons, looms, divers, gulls, terms,
swans, cormorants, pelicans, ducks, geese,
mud hens, snipe, grouse, owls, eagles and
,rows, in all 81 speciea Two-thirds of
hem are now extinct
Prof Cope describes the scene in this re-
zion of fossils as most impressive, owing to
It's wild desolation. As far as the eye can
reach is the same sage-bush desert, the same
ratterless death-barren. Many . man has |
entered it never to escape from its fatal !
brought, especially during the first days of |
he overland emigration to Oregon.
RENE BACH.