4 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM vol. 71 



thicker wall than common was fonnd in a vertical position in bed 

 No. 1, section 3, which carries well preserved St. Marys fossils. All 

 specimens possess the peripheral wall and central core. 



SUGGESTED RELATIONSHIP OF THE COILED SPECIMENS 



In appearance the coiled specimens resemble Daimonelix [some- 

 times spelled Daemonelix by Barbour and other authors], a name 

 proposed by Barbour ^ for gigantic spiral forms occurring in non- 

 marine deposits of northwestern Nebraska. According to O'Harra,^ 

 these peculiar forms occur in the so-called Harrison beds, of lower 

 Miocene age, which form a part of the Arikaree formation. O'Harra ^ 

 says: 



Among the interesting materials of tlie bad land deposits few have given rise 

 to more speculations as to their origin than what are known as the Devil's 

 Corkscrews of the Harrison beds. Devil's Corkscrews, or Daemonelix, as they 

 are technically called, have been known by the early residents of northwestern 

 Nebraska for many years, but it was not until 1S91 when Professor Barbour 

 made a collecting trip to Harrison and the bad lands that these strange 

 objects were brought to the attention of scientific men. What they really 

 represent or how they were formed is still a matter of conjecture. The more 

 typical forms are upright tapering spirals and they twist to the right or to 

 the left indiscriminately. The spiral sometimes encloses a cylindrical body 

 known as the axis but it is more often without the axis. Sometimes the spiral 

 ends abruptly below but more often there projects from the lower part one 

 or two obliquely ascending bodies placed much as the rhizomes of certain 

 plants. The size of the well developed fonu varies considerably. The height 

 of the corkscrew portion often exceeds the height of a man while the rhizome 

 portion is ordinarily about the size of one's body. 



They are known to occur especially between the headwaters of White and 

 Niobrara Rivers chiefly in Sioux County, Nebr., but extend westward to Lusk, 

 Wyo., and eastward to Eagle Nest Butte, S. Dak. The vertical range of strata 

 carrying them is approximately 200 feet. In certain localities they are found 

 in the greatest profusion, sometimes stretching like a forest over many acres 

 and sometimes so closely placed that they are inextricably entangled and fused 

 together. 



Professor Barbour, who has given these interesting forms most study, con- 

 siders them as representing some kind of plant life and has apparently found 

 much to corroborate this view. Some have considered that they represent low 

 plant organisms such as algae, others that they may be remains of higher plants, 

 in which all has decayed away except the cortical layer. Still others, and 

 these with mucli reason, have considered them as casts of well preserved 

 bun'ows of animals. Among the earliest to suggest the latter idea were Dr. 

 Theodore Fuchs, of Germany, and Professor Cope. More recently Mr. O. A. 

 Peterson emphasized the latter view as a result of the finding of numerous 

 fossils of burrowing rodents within the corkscrews. 



The manner of coiling of the more regular forms of Daimonelix 

 occurring in the " Harrison beds," as shown by the illustrations, and 

 the coiled forms from Maryland is similar; but the latter are diminu- 



1 Barbour, E. H., Notice of new gigantic fossils : Science, vol. 19, pp. 99-100, 1892. 



2 O'Harra, C. C, S. Dak. School Minos Bull. No. 13, p. 44, 1920. 

 s Idem, pp. 59-61. 



