*
* See, besides the usual authorities, a valuable paper by Dr. R.
S. Lull, "Dinosaurian Distribution" (1910).
The Diapsid reptiles of the Permian had evolved a group with
horny, parrot-like beaks, the Rhyncocephalia (or "beak-headed"
reptiles), of which the tuatara of New Zealand is a lingering
representative. New Zealand seems to have been cut off from the
southern continent at the close of the Permian or beginning of
the Triassic, and so preserved for us that very interesting relic
of Permian life. From some primitive level of this group, it is
generally believed, the great Deinosaurs arose. Two different
orders seem to have arisen independently, or diverged rapidly
from each other, in different parts of the world. One group seems
to have evolved on the "lost Atlantis," the land between Western
Europe and America, whence they spread westward to America,
eastward over Europe, and southward to the continent which still
united Africa and Australia. We find their remains in all these
regions. Another stock is believed to have arisen in America.
Both these groups seem to have been. more or less biped, rearing
themselves on large and powerful hind limbs, and (in some cases,
at least) probably using their small front limbs to hold or grasp
their food.
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