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In this neighborhood, in Gill, on the borders of Greenfield, 

 two slabs of considerable interest, containing quadrupedal im- 

 pressions have lately been discovered by Mr. Field. One of 

 them, found in the autumn of 1854, was of an irregularly quad- 

 rangular form, and about five feet square ; it was taken from a 

 sandstone rock, near the surface of the earth, inclined at an 

 angle of thirty degrees. The rock is a beautiful red shale, about 

 an inch thick, and is covered with impressions ; there are four 

 lines of tracks of small quadrupeds comprehending in number 

 about two hundred impressions. They are from one to two 

 inches in length, and less than an inch in breadth. Some of the 

 impressions are followed by a linear mark, like that of a tail ; 

 and two or three of them exhibit a distinct brush, behind the 

 footsteps. The tracks sometimes cross each other, but are gen- 

 erally distinct. The toes are usually four in number on the fore 

 feet, and five on the hind, as in frogs. The slab presents in its 

 middle portion three large impressions, a foot and a half distant 

 from each other ; in some respects they represent ornithichnites, 

 but the form is for the most part different from that of any known 

 impression of a bird. A third set of eminences is produced by 

 striae, which have much the appearance of fuci, or seaweed, 

 dragged across the surface of the slab. A fourth set of impres- 

 sions is of small globular bodies about an inch in diameter, 

 probably fruits, or seeds, or ova. Finally, there is an impres- 

 sion of a regular corkscrew form, about two feet long, interrupted 

 in its middle by one of the quadruped tracks. 



A second slab, discovered the last autumn, is larger than that 

 just described. It is about five feet by six, and is covered with 

 impressions of three kinds. 1st, small quadrupedal impressions; 

 2d, ornithic impressions, graduated from the smaller to a very 

 large size ; 3d, three extraordinary impressions, the distance 

 between which is twenty-two inches. These last tracks are con- 

 sidered by President Hitchcock (who has a slab containing very 

 perfect impressions of a form similar to these) to be those of a 

 " tailed giant-biped," to which he has given the name of Gigan- 

 dihus caudatus. These last impressions are very remarkable. 

 On our slab they are three in number, each of them measuring 



PROCEEDINGS B. S. N. H. VOL. V. 20 MARCH, 1856. 



