OP CREATION. 187 



body, are singularly thick and strong. The rock 

 immediately below a particular bed of clay (called 

 the Bradford clay) seems to have been a favourite 

 locality, since the remains are there found in great 

 beauty. The stem, or stony column, terminated 

 with five pairs of short arms rising immediately from 

 the upper plates ; and these, when expanded, collected 

 food and conveyed it to the mouth. 



Although the encrinites are not extremely abun- 

 dant in the oolitic rocks, the tribe of radiated 

 animals, to which they belong, was still amply repre- 

 sented. Star-fishes, sea-eggs, and sea-urchins of va- 

 rious kinds and size are universally distributed, and 

 exceedingly beautiful species of an extinct genus 

 (Cidaris), provided with stoukcal- pig. 66 



careous spines, are found singu- 

 larly perfect (fig. 66). It would 

 hardly be thought possible, that 

 animals provided, as these are, 

 with a vast multitude of thick, 

 heavy, and perfectly solid stony 

 clubs, attached only to the shell at 

 one point, should, notwithstanding, OOLITIC SEA-EGG.* 

 be perfectly free in all its move- (Cidaris.) 



ments, and, in fact, be greatly assisted in its locomo- 

 tion by such appendages. The spines or clubs, to 

 those accustomed only to watch the habits of animals 

 inhabiting the land, and therefore surrounded with air 

 and not water, appear so heavy as to be almost 

 clumsy ; but, in fact, they are so little heavier than 



* In the specimen figured, the stony club-shaped spines are absent, as 

 is often the case in fossils ; but the small mammillated projections to 

 which they were attached by sockets are very beautifully shewn. 



