LOCLE. 115 



oi' long galleries resembling the tracks of marine animals. 

 Cylindrical bodies, which in some parts of the sandstones of 

 Bach occur in great quantities, are probably clue to the filling- 

 up of the dwellings of bivalve Mollusca and wormstoiics, the 

 work of marine worms. We have therefore everywhere before 

 us sea-shore formations into the sand of which animals have 

 either penetrated or have been driven by the force of the 

 waves ; and their fossil remains have thus been covered up and 

 preserved to the present time. 



4. Lode. 



The white freshwater limestones of Locle offer us a portion of 

 the later Miocene flora belonging to a period when the sea had 

 disappeared from these regions. They were deposited during 

 the (Eningian stage at the bottom of the lake which then spread 

 over the district. The innumerable carapaces of a small ostracod 

 crustacean (Cypris faba, fig. 205, p. 6), the pond-mussels (Ano- 

 donta Heerii, May.), and the remains of water-beetles (Dytiscus 

 Nicoleti) and of pondweeds and Charas furnish evidence of the 

 existence of this lake ; and the leaves of reed-maces (Typha] and 

 reeds inform us that it had a marshy sedgy shore. The fan- 

 palm (Sabal Ziegleri] and a large Equisetum also probably lived 

 in the marsh. The flora which surrounded the lake must have 

 been very rich in species ; for the limestone encloses the remains 

 of 140 species, 104 of which were trees or shrubs. The most 

 abundant tree is a laurel (Laurus princeps) ; consequently a 

 laurel-forest must have adorned the landscape. An Andromeda 

 (A. protog&a) and a small-leaved maple (Acer decipiens) were also 

 plentiful. The liquidambars, poplars, and willows, of which ten 

 species occur, probably spread along the river-banks ; whilst the 

 small-leaved Proteacese, the evergreen oaks, and numerous 

 Leguminosse no doubt clothed the drier hills. One of the 

 peculiarities of this flora is the great prominence of the Prote- 

 acese (nine species) ; the latter were spiny twining plants which 

 climbed up the shrubs and trees and garlanded them with their 

 heart-shaped leaves. 



