"The large Cambridge Pterodactyls probably pursued a more substantial prey than dragon-flies. Their teeth are well suited for fish, but probably fowl and small mammals, and even fruits, made a variety in their food. As lord of the cliff, it may be presumed to have taken toll of all animals that could be conquered with tooth and nail. From its brain it might be regarded as an intelligent animal. The jaws present indications of having been sheathed with a horny covering."
Probably the large Pterodactyls of the Cretaceous period, soaring like albatrosses and giant petrels over the surface of the ocean, co-operated with the marine reptiles, such as Ichthyosaurs, Plesiosaurs, crocodiles, and others, as those sea-birds now do with the whales, porpoises, and dolphins, in reducing the excessive numbers of the teeming tribes of fishes, and in maintaining the balance of oceanic life.
With regard to the place of Pterodactyls in the animal kingdom, Professor Seeley places them as a distinct sub-class, side by side with birds, and between mammals and reptiles, thus--
Mammalia. O r n i t A h v o e s s a u r i a Reptilia.
The name Ornithosauria (bird-lizards) is frequently used instead of the other name, because it expresses the idea of their being partly saurian, and partly bird-like.
They flourished from the period of the Lias to that of the Chalk; and then, like so many other strange forms, seem to have suddenly disappeared.
"Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep, Where the winds are all asleep; Where the spent lights quiver and gleam, Where the salt weed sways in the stream; Where the sea-beasts, ranged all round, Feed in the ooze of their pasture-ground; Where the sea-snakes coil and twine, Dry their mail, and bask in the brine."
It has been said that everything on earth has its double in the water. Are there not water-beetles, water-scorpions, water-rats, water-snakes, sea-lions, sea-horses, and a host of other living things, whether plants or animals, bearing some sort of resemblance to others that live on land? Then why not sea-serpents? The great controversy of the sea-serpent, that has so often been discussed in the newspapers, need not be considered here. We are dealing not with the present, but with the past; and whether or no the wonderful sailors' yarns of sea-serpents can be regarded as authentic, even in a single case, we can offer our readers infallible proof that, during the so-called "Age of Reptiles," certain monstrous saurian animals flourished in considerable abundance, which, though not true serpents, nevertheless must have borne a striking resemblance to such, as they cleaved he waters of primæval seas.[32]