fertile and vital world that can support even such a swift, a ruthless, a ravenous and intelligent hunter as this. I introduce you to Dagger, the name we have given tohim. "
Shellabarger approached the cage. He turned and glared judgmentally at the audience. "Do you expect a show of animals jumping through hoops and sitting on boxes, batting at my puny whip? Dagger the venator recognizes no master, refuses to be trained, waits only for the day--perhaps not far off--when he will escape his cage and hunt again, with a top speed of twenty-four miles an hour--faster than you or I can run--across the cloud-shadowed grassland and cool rain forests of El Grande, all that he loves and knows, all that he desires . . .
"Except perhaps to sink his jaws into me, to crack my head like an egg!"
The crowd sucked in its breath disapprovingly. Peter gulped, looked around for his father and found him with camera practically glued to his face, standing in shadows less than ten feet from the cage. Much too close, Peter thought.
"We can well believe that Dagger wants to take revenge for his capture, his imprisonment--for all these long years away from the clouds and forests of El Grande."
Shellabarger strode across the ring to the cage containing Sammy the centrosaur and opened the broad, high door. The centrosaur trotted through the door, swinging his head slowly from side to side as he approached Shellabarger. Sammy lifted his beaked snout and squalled his disapproval at being once again placed so near the venator. Shellabarger tapped the long forward-curved nose horn with the stock of his whip, and Sammy turned toward him, mouth open. The trainer shoved something from his pocket into Sammy's mouth, and the centrosaur closed his eyes in ecstasy, lifted his snout, and gave a nasal bullish snort.
"Sammy has learned to live among us and accept our generosity. But in a dinosaur's life, as in the lives of men, there are stages, and the time has come for endings. Never again will these animals perform for the simple pleasure of a human audience."
A rustling sound from outside the ring attracted Peter's attention. Three brilliantly plumed birds the size of turkeys, with long feathered tails, flapped across the ring. One landed on the centrosaur's frill, the other on his nose. Sammy did not seem to mind. The birds spread their wings two yards wide, twisted their heads, and opened their mouths to reveal rows of small white teeth. These were the famous toothed birds, Peter realized, smallest of the avisaurs, unique to the tepuis, the only ones of their kind in captivity. Red and green, with shiny black backs and white-fringed black tails, these descendants of Archaeopteryx, christenedEoavis by Maple White, plucked treats from Shellabarger's fingers and lifted their fleshy feathered tails.
"Pretty little cousins ofStratoraptor, " Harryhausen said. "What I'd give to see one ofthose! Biggest bird that ever lived . . ."
Peter nodded, but without conviction.
"All that these animals have taught us," Shellabarger went on, "all that we have learned of the true nature of the past, we owe to a fluke of nature unparalleled in Earth's history: the Grand Tepui. Because of the majestic isolation of this mighty plateau, we can observe directly the evolution of reptilian lizard into dinosaur, dinosaur into bird, bird into the tiniest and most beautiful of jewels, as well as into the fiercest predators of all, theTotenadlers or death eagles sacred to the Pepon and Camaracota Indians . . . Only on the Grand Tepui. Compare the venator to this fabled and seldom-seen beast, never captured . . . imagine the animal that made the brave, foolhardy, and indomitable Professor Challenger wish he had never been born . . ."
Peter made the comparison. Dagger the venator looked fierce enough.
The toothed birds flapped their wings and leaped a short distance from Sammy's nose to the outspread and gloved hands of the trainer. Flagg the ringmaster returned. In the outer rings,
Shellabarger approached the cage. He turned and glared judgmentally at the audience. "Do you expect a show of animals jumping through hoops and sitting on boxes, batting at my puny whip? Dagger the venator recognizes no master, refuses to be trained, waits only for the day--perhaps not far off--when he will escape his cage and hunt again, with a top speed of twenty-four miles an hour--faster than you or I can run--across the cloud-shadowed grassland and cool rain forests of El Grande, all that he loves and knows, all that he desires . . .
"Except perhaps to sink his jaws into me, to crack my head like an egg!"
The crowd sucked in its breath disapprovingly. Peter gulped, looked around for his father and found him with camera practically glued to his face, standing in shadows less than ten feet from the cage. Much too close, Peter thought.
"We can well believe that Dagger wants to take revenge for his capture, his imprisonment--for all these long years away from the clouds and forests of El Grande."
Shellabarger strode across the ring to the cage containing Sammy the centrosaur and opened the broad, high door. The centrosaur trotted through the door, swinging his head slowly from side to side as he approached Shellabarger. Sammy lifted his beaked snout and squalled his disapproval at being once again placed so near the venator. Shellabarger tapped the long forward-curved nose horn with the stock of his whip, and Sammy turned toward him, mouth open. The trainer shoved something from his pocket into Sammy's mouth, and the centrosaur closed his eyes in ecstasy, lifted his snout, and gave a nasal bullish snort.
"Sammy has learned to live among us and accept our generosity. But in a dinosaur's life, as in the lives of men, there are stages, and the time has come for endings. Never again will these animals perform for the simple pleasure of a human audience."
A rustling sound from outside the ring attracted Peter's attention. Three brilliantly plumed birds the size of turkeys, with long feathered tails, flapped across the ring. One landed on the centrosaur's frill, the other on his nose. Sammy did not seem to mind. The birds spread their wings two yards wide, twisted their heads, and opened their mouths to reveal rows of small white teeth. These were the famous toothed birds, Peter realized, smallest of the avisaurs, unique to the tepuis, the only ones of their kind in captivity. Red and green, with shiny black backs and white-fringed black tails, these descendants of Archaeopteryx, christenedEoavis by Maple White, plucked treats from Shellabarger's fingers and lifted their fleshy feathered tails.
"Pretty little cousins ofStratoraptor, " Harryhausen said. "What I'd give to see one ofthose! Biggest bird that ever lived . . ."
Peter nodded, but without conviction.
"All that these animals have taught us," Shellabarger went on, "all that we have learned of the true nature of the past, we owe to a fluke of nature unparalleled in Earth's history: the Grand Tepui. Because of the majestic isolation of this mighty plateau, we can observe directly the evolution of reptilian lizard into dinosaur, dinosaur into bird, bird into the tiniest and most beautiful of jewels, as well as into the fiercest predators of all, theTotenadlers or death eagles sacred to the Pepon and Camaracota Indians . . . Only on the Grand Tepui. Compare the venator to this fabled and seldom-seen beast, never captured . . . imagine the animal that made the brave, foolhardy, and indomitable Professor Challenger wish he had never been born . . ."
Peter made the comparison. Dagger the venator looked fierce enough.
The toothed birds flapped their wings and leaped a short distance from Sammy's nose to the outspread and gloved hands of the trainer. Flagg the ringmaster returned. In the outer rings,
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