98 OUR COMMON BRITISH FOSSILS. 



CHAPTER IV. 



ENCRINITES. 



THERE are no fossils with which the delighted young 

 geologist sooner becomes acquainted than those called 

 Encrinites. Especially is this the case if he has 

 worked among the rocks of the Palaeozoic period. 

 The limestones of the Silurian, Devonian, and Car- 

 boniferous epochs are often crowded with the varied 

 remains of the fossils which half-popularly and 

 half-scientifically come under the denominational 

 name of Encrinites. True, the student frequently has 

 hazy, and even erroneous, notions as to what they 

 really are. But perhaps the most important thing to 

 him is that they are fossils remains of creatures which 

 actually lived millions of years ago, in seas other than 

 any now existing, and that he has collected them with 

 his own hands. The first flush of geological investiga- 

 tion surrounds these common palseontological objects 

 with a halo of interest which is not eclipsed even by 

 fuller and more accurate knowledge of them. They 

 are the treasured objects of sunny holiday rambles 



