46 THE DAWN OP LIFE. 



Gumbel recognised the organism in Laurentian Rocks 

 in Bavaria and elsewhere in Europe, and discovered a 

 new species in the Huronian of Bavaria."* Eozoon 

 was recognised in Laurentian limestones in Massa- 

 chusetts f and New York, and there has been a rapid 

 growth of new facts increasing our knowledge of Fora- 

 minifera of similar types in the succeeding Palaeozoic 

 rocks. Special interest attaches to the discovery by 

 Mr. Vennor of specimens of Eozoon contained in a 

 dark micaceous limestone at Tudor, in Ontario, and 

 really as little metamorphosed as many Silurian fossils. 

 Though in this state they show their minute structures 

 less perfectly than in the serpentine specimens, the 

 fact is most important with reference to the vindica- 

 tion of the animal nature of Eozoon. Another fact 

 whose significance is not to be over-estimated, is the 

 recognition both by Dr. Carpenter and myself of speci- 

 mens in which the canals are occupied by calcite like 

 that of the organism itself. Quite recently I have, as 

 mentioned in the last chapter, been enabled to re-ex- 

 amine the locality at Petite Nation originally disco- 

 vered by Mr. Lowe, and am prepared to show that all 

 the facts with reference to the mode of occurrence of 



* Ueber das Vorkommen von Eozoon, 1866. 



f By Mr. Bicknell at ISTewbury, and Mr. Burbank at Chelms- 

 ford. The latter gentleman has since maintained that the 

 limestones at the latter place are not true beds; but his own 

 descriptions and figures, lead to the belief that this is an 

 error of observation on his part. The Eozoon in the Chelms- 

 ford specimens and in those of Warren, New York, is in small 

 and rare fragments in serpentinous limestone. 



