EXTRACTS FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC. 147 



drawing resembling two clubbed feet. He found one slab 14 feet 

 long that had the tracks of at least a dozen different animals cross- 

 ing it. He felt certain that if ever that aforesaid quarry should 

 be re-opened it would be found rich in foot tracks. 



Dr. Barrett exhibited very excellent drawings of all these foot 

 tracks, which excited great curiosity among the audience. 



Prof. Hitchcock said that formerly he gave names to the tracks 

 found in the red sandstone instead of the animals that made them ; 

 iH lause, except the tracks, there is no relic left of those animals 

 wnrth mentioning. But at the suggestion of Mr. Dana he had 

 iiiaile out a classification and nomenclature of all the animals 

 wliose tracks had been found in the red sandstone of the Connec- 

 ticut valley. These animals were ciaiefly birds of a very low order 

 of organization. He then read off his list of names given to these 

 birds. The species were 35 • and the genera were 20 ; he tried 

 to make the number smaller, but could not without classing to- 

 gether species that are more unlike than w'hat we find in living 

 iiiimals. He had measured the feet in every possible way, with 

 ■are, the same as phrenologists measure the head ; and done all in 

 ids power to classify them correctly. 



Prof. Silliman read a letter from Dr. Dean of Amherst, t\dio has 

 'bund fossil foot marks in a new location near Amherst. He be- 

 ,ran by stating the incredulity with which the announcement of 

 he discovery of these foot marks w^as received. Since then all the 

 geologists of England have given in their adhesion to the subject. 

 ^ince then enormous birds (fossil) have been discovered in the allu- 

 vial deposit of New-Zealand, and sent to England, of a larger size 

 han any found and claimed by Prof. Hitchcock. Recently speci- 

 nens of bird tracks have been found near Greenville in Penn,; also 

 ;ome like terrestrial animals ; air-breathing, ^varm blooded animals, 

 ') toed and long foot ; also some of the large hand-footed tribe — 

 ikethehuman hand — now by Dr, Owen proved to have belonged to 

 I large Batracian animal, one of the frog tribe — a frog as large as a 

 )ull, or an elephant — one of the great croakers of his day ! There 

 ire numerous tracks of these frogs where they kept dancing about 

 m the rocks, and these are many hundred feet below the new red 

 andstone, and they are below the coal. These convince me that 

 vhilst the earth was being fitted to pass into its present state, after 

 he era in which it was occupied entirely by marine animals ; then 

 ;ame the ornithold era, then a reptilic era, then the interesting se- 

 ies connected with the coal beds, then the enormous Saurian rep- 

 lies through the great series of the Lias and the Oolites up to the 

 ■halk • passing through that peculiar formation we come to the 

 )eriod of terrestrial animals and to the era of the present forests 

 nd that of man. Dr. Dean states that he has found 10 or 12 spe- 

 imens of these five toed foot tracks, with the bunch part, like the 

 'all of the hand, and behind each track there is an oblong, irregu- 



