We are surrounded by dinosaurs. From toilet paper to teacups, television specials and Hollywood films, and more than 300 current books, dinosaurs are as ubiquitous as Ninja Turtles. But dinosaurs are no fad, as merchandisers have belatedly realized. They are a rite-of-passage for the young, a fascination that grips every generation.

Our love for dinosaurs is beyond reason. We loved dinosaurs when they were presented as elephantine behemoths, as cold-blooded sluggards. And we love them all the more now that explorations indicate some were as smart as ostriches, as swift as foxes (not as swift as cheetahs nor as smart as chimpanzees, except in the imaginations of Messrs. Crichton and Spielberg), as small as turkeys, as maternal as Donna Reed, as hot-blooded as Madonna, and that all endured far longer than we. World-dominant and immensely varied in form, habitat and behavior for 160,000,000 years, dinosaurs were, arguably, the greatest of all evolutionary success stories.