"That's it!" cried the professor, seizing on the opportunity to impart a little information. "The word hippopotamus is familiar to you—and even to small children—because it has often been used, and because you have seen circus pictures of it. Well, if we had Brontotheriums on earth now, everyone would be using the name without stopping to think how to pronounce it, and they could spell it as easily as you can spell hippopotamus. Most words of Latin or Greek derivation are easy to pronounce once you try them.
"There are other names of animals in everyday use that would 'stump' us if we stopped to think of them, but we don't. We rattle off mammoth, rhinoceros, giraffe and boa constrictor easily."
"Yes, they sound easy enough," argued Bud.
"Well, all you need to do is to apply to the extinct monsters the same principle of pronunciation that you use in saying hippopotamus, and you have done the trick," went on Professor Wright. "In fact, it is all rather simple."
"Simple," murmured Dick. "Bront—bront—brontotherium!"
"Take it by degrees," advised Professor Wright, "and remember that generally these names are made up of one or two or even more Greek or Latin words. Sometimes a Greek and Latin word is combined, but that really is not scientific.
"Now, in the case of the brontotherium, we have two Greek words which excellently describe the animal whose bones I am after. That is the description fits, as nearly as anything can to something we have never seen.
"There is a Greek word—bronte it is pronounced in English, and it means, in a sense, thunder. Another Greek word is therion, which means wild beast.
"Then bronto—bronto—therion must mean—thunder beast!" cried Dick, rather proud that he had thus pieced together some information.
"That's it!" announced Professor Wright. "You see how easy it is. Change therion to therium and you have it."