x PHENOMENA OF ORGANIC NATURE 347 
| 2 animals are imbedded. There are some specimens 
in which turtles’ eggs have been imbedded in 
alcareous sand, and before the sun had hatched 
| “a he young turtles, they became covered over with 
ealeareous mud, and thus have been preserved 
| and fossilised. 
Not only does this process of imbedding and 
fe ssilisation occur with marine and other aquatic 
“animals and plants, but it affects those land 
animals and plants which are drifted away to sea, 
or become buried in bogs or morasses; and the 
nimals which have been trodden down by their 
fe os and crushed in the mud at the river's 
be ank, as the herd have come to drink. In any of 
Bhsac cases, the organisms may be crushed or be 
mutilated, before or after putrefaction, in such a 
3 nner that perhaps only a part will be left in 
the form in which it reaches us. It is, indeed, a 
most remarkable fact, that it is quite an exceptional 
ase to find a skeleton of any one of all the 
thousands of wild land animals that we know are 
constantly being killed, or dying in the course of 
“nature: they are preyed on and devoured by 
other animals, or die in places where their bodies 
e not afterwards protected by mud. There are 
ther animals existing on the sea, the shells of 
which form exceedingly large deposits. You are 
probably aware that before the attempt was made 
) lay the Atlantic telegraphic cable, the Govern- 
ment employed vessels in making a series of very 
