NOTE-BOOK OF A NATURALIST. 299 



whose foot was fifteen inches long, exdusive of the largest 

 claw, which w^as two inches in length. The toes w^ere 

 broad and thick, and in one track appeared a regular 

 succession of six of these steps, four feet distant from each 

 other. The distance in other tracks varied from four to 

 six feet. Another footmark extended to the length of 

 from fifteen to sixteen inches, without reckoning a re- 

 markable appendage extending backwards eight or nine 

 inches from the heel. The impressions of this appendage 

 present traces similar to what may be made by wiry- 

 feathers or coarse bristles ; these last appear to have sunk 

 into the ground nearly an inch. The toes had penetrated 

 much deeper, and the mud or sand appeared to have been 

 raised into a rido-e risino: several inches around their im- 

 pressions, reminding the observer of the elevation round 

 the track of an elephant over moist clay. Intervals of 

 six feet were noted as the length of the stride of the im- 

 pressor of this so called ornithichnite. The bones of 

 fishes only (Palceothrissum) had been discovered in this 

 impressed rock. 



If Professor Hitchcock be right in his conclusion, that 

 these enormous foot-prints are the vestiges of feathered 

 giants, there can be no doubt that they justify the remark 

 that they are of the highest interest to the palseontologist, 

 as they establish the new fact of the existence of birds at 

 the early epoch of the new red sandstone formation ; and 

 further show that some of the most ancient forms of that 

 class attained a size far exceeding that of the largest 

 among the feathered inhabitants of the present world. 



The discovery of the bones of the gigantic Dinornis 

 (Ow^en), have proved beyond all question the last con- 

 clusion: but the student will do well, before he accepts 

 the former, to investigate thoroughly Professor Owen's 

 papers on Lahyvintlioclon* remembering that the toes 



* Geol. Trans. Second Series. 



