386 Dr. Dearie on the Discovery of Fossil Footmarks. 



and published in the first volume of Transactions, contains but a 

 bare allusion to the fact. Most of these specimens were of remark- 

 able interest, and many of them were single examples. Of the 

 expenditure of time and money in procuring these fossils, I need 

 only say, that these items were by no means inconsiderable, but 

 I was laboring for the love I bore the cause. The results of my 

 exertions at this period, were well calculated to illustrate the per- 

 fect analogy between the extinct and existing races of birds, for 

 no example had hitherto been seen that displayed the order of 

 articulations, and the form and insertion of the talons.* Without 

 these indispensable features, the true characters of no impressions 

 can be determined ; for all others are more or less imperfect. 



During the sitting of the Association, &c. in May last, a com- 

 munication appeared in the Northampton newspaper, circulating 

 extensively in the neighborhood of Amherst, from a correspond- 

 ent in Washington, alluding generally to the business before that 

 learned body, and particularly to so much of the address of Mr. 

 H. on footmarks as relates to their discovery. The obvious im- 

 port of the allusion to this subject, was to weaken the validity of 

 my claim, by conferring the honor of discovery on a Mr. Moody 



M 



Mr.M 



of myself was the somewhat equivocal expression, that the sub- 

 ject was first "pointed out" to me by a Mr. Wilson, in 1834, (I 

 never saw them until 1835,) and by me in turn to Mr. H. ! Thus 

 in stereotype phrase, making me a mere negative instrument be- 

 tween the pretended discoverer and his historian. When 1 knew 

 that the authorship of this letter was due to Mr. H., when its ob- 

 ject was apparent, I could not repress the consciousness of my 

 humble efforts to supply him with materiel for his periodical me- 

 moirs. I felt the injustice of this deliberate attempt to place me 



not only subordinate to himself, but to another to 

 whom I declare I was never under an obligation of any nature 

 whatsoever ; and after all that had passed between Mr. H. and 



i 



position 



* In the thirty-sixth plate of the Final Report, the claws of this enormous foot 

 are drawn long and sharp like a bodkin, and are inserted far back into the inferior 

 surface of the fleshy protuberance of the joint. These discoveries prove the mis- 

 take of this inference, the claws of this and most other varieties being thick and 

 blunt, and comparatively short, and their insertion conforms to that of living birds 

 without the least deviation. 



