, 1905-01-17

femur about two and one-half inches BY
a cushion. Of cartilagenous matter. Al
the ends of the bones are rough. where
as they would have been smooth had
they touched and rubbed as the huge
animal made his way over the ground
AT the bottom Of the tibia and Hbuls
is the first bone Of the foot, also separ
ated from the upper bones by q cush'
lon. but closer to them than they were
to the femur. Mr.. Reed was unable to
find nor Of the bones Of the foot, and
will supply them with bones Of other
animals of the same general nature,
but much smaller in size, the shape
making up for lack of size and show.
in gwhat the osseou structure was
like.
There are sixteen ribs from this ami.
NAL, each seven feet four inches. long,
and a vertebra of seventeen inches
cross centrum. There were at least a
carload of broken bits OF bone Of the
skeleton in the matrix, from which
these bones were taken. but Mr.. Reed
was unable to save enough of the
pieces to form an addition to the skee,
ton.
AS yet the interesting specimen is
unnamed and partially unclassiied. He
is known to have been about 100 feet
long, to have weighed perhaps 100, 900
pounds, to have stood twenty-three
feet high at the highest point of his
gracefully arched back, and to have
been a genuine vegetable eater. The
head was small, the neck snakelike,
the body very large and curved along
the back and underneath the belly. the
tail long n the limbs massive enough
to have supported the great weight of
the body and allowed the animal to
make his way through the low ,marshy,
rankly covered ground on which he fed.
He was a true reptilian. spending most
of his time in water or in the soft mud
Of the waters edge, feeding with his
long neck upon the tender plants that
grew in the then tropical jungles
where now stand the Rocky mountains
and tower the peaks Is GOO feet above
the level Of the sea.
Every geological indication points
to the fact, Mr.. Reed says, that part
of the surface surrounding the feeding
place OF this mighty specimen of the
animal kingdom was lower b. several
miles that the present surface. 1t was
raised higher by some mighty upheav-
al, which produced the mountains of
the present day, leaving unmistakable
signs in the fossils of the period and in
the strata of rock comprising the pres
ent surface. There came with the
upheaval a changing Of the tempera-
ture, and the tropical vegetation Of
that era gave way. in the innumerable
centuries, to the present growth and
the barren rocks forming the backbone
Of the continent. The upheaval Of the
earth lifted the bones Of this monster
and planted them in the preserving
clays, the ossifying principle. that has
handed them down to the hand Of man
for the u~nraveling of the mystery OF
the long-ago period. Who can say 1t
the infancy Of the earth? Who
can say it was not as far from the in
fancy-from the creation-as that
period was from thistle 10000 CEN
turtles that have fed since the animal
whose bones we now see lived and fed
upon the things that gave him life?
So far as is known this is the fossil
remains of the largest animal ever un-
covered in the world. 1t has been stat
ed that the Field Columbian museum
at Chicago has q larger, discovered in
but Prof. Reed has 81 far
been unable to find definite data al to
its size. This is the largest ever un.
covered for the museum of h Univer-
sity Of Wyoming. and stands alone as
to all the other collections in the coun
try. There are speciment of a num-
Der of huge dinosaurs in the museum
here. but they are mere playthings be-
side this one. Mr.. Reed is nearly six
feet high, but standing beside this
huge, restoration he seems but a boy.
the bone reaching several inches furth-
er upward that he. 1t was found IN q
bone quarry about fifty miles north
west of Laramie this last summer. and
Mr.. Reed and his assistants dug and
delved and lifted until they had
brought it out piece by piece. Now he
has 1t mounted, the four bones Of the
limb placed as they were in life, and by
patient fitting and toll he will add
foot bones to make a nearly complete
limb.
The femur; marked w. No. l." was
found with one end protruding above
the surface Of the ground and running
downward. He started to dig al the
point Of the great bone. following the
outline of the six feet Of its length and
then six feet further bringing to light
the tibia and fibula, with the astrasulus.
the ankle bone. which a~rticulates with
the tibia at the ankle. The huge massof
broken bones was brought out, piece
by piece, and found to be utterly worth
less, 80 many Of the broken bits hav-
ing crumbled to decay and lost their
.shana in the enclosing clay or loam.