Montour American. (Danville, Pa.) 1866-1920, 1906-04-12
GIANTS OF THE PAST
PREVIOUS AGES SUPPLY US WITH
ENORMOUS FOSSIL BONES.


that the body Of Pallas. the son of
Evander. had been discovered beneath
the tomb OF the Emperor Henry III.
The bones were enormous aud proved
TO have belonged to a huge fossil ele-
phant As late as the fifteenth century
n war Of words was waged over a find
Of large bones one party claiming that
they belonged to the giant TeutobOchus.
In 1851 a giant was discovered in
Switzerland. The council Of Lucerne
requested a learned scientific man. Pro
fessor Felix Platter OF Basel, to report
upon it. and he not only announced the
bones as part of n human giant but
made a complete restoration, showing
the man twenty feet high. which the
/ proud city adopted as an ancestor in
the arms Of the commonwealth. Unfor
! tunately for the theory and much to the
discontinue of the people who had
raised TO high pinnacle this mighty
ancestor 1t was found TO be the re-
mains Of an elephant
Nearly all the mastodOn finds We're
attributed to giants. but there is no evi-
dence that a human giant ever existed
! over eight feet in height. and 1t IS eX-
| tremely doubtful If this height was
ever attained
Giants other than human are very
common in all branches of the animal
kingdom-giantS in every sense when
compared TO their pygmy representa-
tives Of today Some years ago some
laborers in the Senalik hills of India
were engaged upon Il government
work when they came upon the re
mains of a turtle that proved beyond
question that these animals had their
giants in the days of old. The shell
which the men exposed might have
been used as a shelter for several men,
and at first. before its bony nature
was observed. it was thought by the
natives TO be hut Of some kind. For
tunatelv the bones were unin1ured, and
they We're taken out and removed to
the British museum, where a complete
restoration. of the animal may be seen.
The length of the turtle was ten feet,
its horizontal circumference twenty
five feet and its girth fifteen feet, but
it was estimated by scientists that
this was not an adult and that when
fully grown this huge creature would
display Il dOme-like back eight or nine
feet high, giving total length of
twenty feet
One of the common animals in equa-
torial South America and in Central
. Ln rl t,rrlo which
attainS Il length of four or FIVE feet
and is considered rather large but
it was pygmy when compared TO an
ancestor that once wandered over Eng
land and various portions of the world.
A number of years ago some working
men were excavating and blasting in
quarry near Maidstone, England, when
some bones were uncovered that caus-
ed profound astonishment on the part
of the finders. The skeleton was per
feet, and as 1t was lifted out, bone by
bone. their amaZement increased, and
the news was spread all over the coun-
try. attracting large numbers of peo-
pie When the bones were placed IN
their proper position they were found
TO be the skeleton of gigantic lizard
that when alive must have been three
times as bulky as the largest living ele-
phant and stood upon its hind legs Ike
a kangaroo, tearing down branches
from the highest trees. Such an anil
NAL was a slow mover and sluggish
and must have fallen an easy prey to
the human hunters, if they existed.
The marine giants were even more
bizarre and remarkable than the lana
forms If we can imagine the little
iguana heightened out to thirty feet, It's
back spines changed TO broad Unlike
objects, we form some idea of the ap-
pearance of one of the small dinosaurs,
Stegosaurus ungulatus, one OF the most
uncanny and remarkable creatures ever
, found 1t is called the plated lizard
and the best skeleton was found on the
eastern flank of the Rocky mountains.
Some Of the plates with which this ar
mored lizard were protected were two
or three feet In diameter and the spines
over two feet In length. From the fact
that the hind limbs We're the largest IL
IS evident that this strange creature
could lift itself up and sit like kan
garoo. resting upon its powerful ta1l
which. with lis enormous spines, must
have been a terrible weapon.
A giant from America had a skull
that measured eight feet in length. Al
most over the eyes were two large
horns. a thirG placed over the nose. The
great length IF the skull was given by
a huge crest that was protected by q
ridge of long plates. The mouth OF the
tricaratcps --as protected 10y horny
beak In Ifs it must have presented a
formidable appearance. with pody
clumsy and low like that Of hippo
potamus, long tail like an alligator 8
its head calling to mind the rhinoceros.
This monster was twenty-five feet In
length and must have been one of the
strangest al;lmals Of its time.-London
; Spectator.