They didn't wheeze from internal motion nor blinkle from synapses throbbing on impulse power. But they were cold—initially. Diamond veins traced just below a mesh that convinced of suppleness.

The bastard and the traitor, / The wolfcub and the snake, / The robber, swindler, hater, / Are in your homes—awake!

O Death! O Death! Won't you spare me over till another year? - part of the refrain from the American folk song A Conversation with Death.

According to Luckett (1985), Bugge (1985), and George (1985), ctenodactylids are an early offshoot of the hystricognathous rodents. Beintema et al. (1991), stating that no molecular data were available, investigated tissues, blood, and proteins and concluded that it was not yet possible to determine whether ctrnodactylids and hystricognathous rodents share a common ancestor or are located on separate branches.