Mr. Ross Cox, in the relation of
his travels across the Rocky Mountains, says, "that the Upper Crees, a
tribe who inhabit the country in the vicinity of the Athabasca river,
have a curious tradition with respect to these animals They allege 'that
these animals were of frightful magnitude, that they formerly lived in
the plains, a great distance in the south, where they had destroyed all
the game, after which they retired to the mountains. They killed
everything, and if their agility had been equal to their size and
ferocity, they would have destroyed all the Indians. One man asserted
that his great-grandfather told him he saw one of those animals in a
mountain pass, where he was hunting, and that on hearing its roar, which
he compared to loud thunder, the sight almost left his eyes, and his
heart became as small as that of a child's.'"]
[Footnote 9: A few miles from the Pacific Ocean, and at the foot of a
mountain called by the Shoshones the Dwelling of the Monster, were found
the remains of an immense lizard belonging to an extinct family of the
saurian species. Within a few inches of the surface, and buried in a bed
of shells and petrified fish, our old missionary, Padre Antonio, digged
up fifty-one vertebrae quite whole and well preserved. They were mostly
from twelve to eighteen inches in length and from eight to fourteen
inches in diameter, measuring in all more than fifteen feet in length.
Pages:
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45