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Cope was born more directly into privilege—his father was a rich Philadelphia businessman—and was by far the more adventurous of the two. In the summer of 1876 in Montana while George Armstrong Custer and his troops were being cut down at Little Big Horn, Cope was out hunting for bones nearby. When it was pointed out to him that this was probably not the most prudent time to be taking treasures from Indian lands, Cope thought for a minute and decided to press on anyway. He was having too good a season. At one point he ran into a party of suspicious Crow Indians, but he managed to win them over by repeatedly taking out and replacing his false teeth.
柯普生于一個特權(quán)家庭——他的父親是費城一位有錢的商人——比馬什更富有冒險精神，1876年夏天，在蒙大拿州，當喬治·阿姆斯特朗·卡斯特和他的部隊在小比格角被消滅的時候，柯普還在附近找骨頭。有人提醒他，這時候來印第安人領(lǐng)地取寶，很可能是很不明智的。他想了片刻，決定繼續(xù)往下干。他的收獲太大了。有一次，他遇上了幾個疑心重重的克勞族印第安人，但他不停地取下和裝上他的假牙，贏得了他們的信任。
For a decade or so, Marsh and Cope's mutual dislike primarily took the form of quiet sniping, but in 1877 it erupted into grandiose dimensions. In that year a Colorado schoolteacher named Arthur Lakes found bones near Morrison while out hiking with a friend. Recognizing the bones as coming from a "gigantic saurian," Lakes thoughtfully dispatched some samples to both Marsh and Cope. A delighted Cope sent Lakes a hundred dollars for his trouble and asked him not to tell anyone of his discovery, especially Marsh. Confused, Lakes now asked Marsh to pass the bones on to Cope. Marsh did so, but it was an affront that he would never forget.
有10年左右的時間，馬什和柯普之間的敵對關(guān)系主要以暗斗的形式出現(xiàn)，但到了1877年，暗斗突然變成了大規(guī)模的沖突。那年，一位名叫阿瑟·萊克斯的科羅拉多州小學老師和他的一位朋友出門徒步旅行，在莫里森附近發(fā)現(xiàn)了幾根骨頭。萊克斯認為那些骨頭屬于一條“巨蜥”；他想得很周到，把一些樣品寄給了馬什和柯普兩個人?？缕蘸芨吲d，給萊克斯寄了100美元作為報酬，吩咐他不要把他的發(fā)現(xiàn)告訴任何人，尤其不要告訴馬什。萊克斯不大明白，便請馬什把骨頭轉(zhuǎn)交給柯普。馬什這么做了，但遭到了一番他永生難忘的羞辱。
