Whether shores Devonian or Silurian beaches—
Tell us thy strange story!
Or has the professor slightly antedated
By some thousand years thy advent on this planet,
Giving thee an air that's somewhat better fitted
For cold-blooded creatures?
Wert thou true spectator of that mighty forest
When above thy head the stately Sigillaria
Reared its columned trunks in that remote and distant
Carboniferous epoch?
Tell us of that scene—the dim and watery woodland
Songless, silent, hushed, with never bird or insect
Veiled with spreading fronds and screened with tall club-mosses,
Lycopodiacea—
When beside thee walked the solemn Plesiosaurus,
And around thee crept the festive Ichthyosaurus,
While from time to time above thee flew and circled
Cheerful Pterodactyls.
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The Pliocene Skull.
