180 On the Foot-marks of Animals in Rocks. 



concretions, such as the muschelkalk and new red sandstone of- 

 ten present, might have been taken for these marks in relief, 

 moulded, so to speak, into the hollows of the imprints. These 

 doubts, however, have disappeared from the minds of all those 

 geologists who have seen the great stone, from ten to twelve feet 

 long and from three to four broad, which has just been deposit- 

 ed in the Mineralogical Museum of Berlin, and of which I now 

 transmit a drawing, which has been most carefully executed un- 

 der the direction of M. Wicss, superintendent of the museum. 

 That I might exhibit the phenomenon with the greater perspi- 

 cuity, I have had the trace left by one animal alone drawn, out 

 of a great many of those which had traversed the rock. Mr 

 Weiss has distinguished among these animals, and among the 

 smaller of them, as many as three or four different species. 

 The route which these smaller ones followed, crosses almost at 

 right angles, that of the great mammalia. This animal is 

 especially remarkable for the inequality of the size of the an- 

 terior and posterior extremities. All the marks represent five 

 toes ; and the animal most probably belonged to the order M ar- 

 supialia. M. Wiegman has compared it to the Didelphis ; but 

 the conformation of the toes of the posterior extremity differ 

 considerably from the Didelphis, the kangarroo and wombat, 

 which have one toe almost rudimental. At Berlin we have 

 the overlying rock, and, consequently, the foot-marks present 

 themselves in relief. Those of the hind foot shew a foot which 

 had been very fleshy. The animal appears to have supported 

 the whole of its weight upon it; its step appears to have been 

 like that of the bear ; it has been a kind of amble, the small 

 right anterior extremity is placed very regularly quite near to 

 the right hind foot ; even in the fore feet the thumb is separat- 

 ed from the four other toes, almost as in the quadrumana. The 

 animal considerably resembles the form of the Phalangista, three 

 species of which, of very large dimensions, are in the Museum 

 of Leyden. It is for zoologists to determine whether the ani- 

 mal is one of the Phalangista, or if it approximates the Loris ; 

 my opinion can be of no importance. M. Sickler has fq^nd the 

 prints of the hind feet from twelve to thirteen inches long. In 

 another fragment of the rock in the Berlin Museum, the toes 

 appear more slender. I have caused this n:ark to be drawn sc- 



