'i 



'n 



2^6 RELICS OF PRIMEVAL LIFE 



skeleton with such chambers, canals, and tubuli 

 could be formed ; and this is solved by the dis- 

 covery that all these facts correspond precisely with 

 those to be found in the shells of modern oceanic 

 nil Foraminifera. The existence, then, of Eozoon, its 



*** structure, and its relations to the containing rocks 



''j and minerals being admitted, no rational explana- 



„j tion of its origin seems at present possible other 



'V| than that advocated in the preceding pages. 



If the reader will now turn to the fierures in the 

 '•• illustration on the opposite page (Fig. 59), he will 



find a selection of examples bearing on the above 

 '"* arguments and objections. Fig, i represents a por- 



i tion of a very thin slice of a specimen traversed by 



' veins of fibrous serpentine or chrysotile, and having 



the calcite of the walls more broken by cleavage 



planes than usual. The portion selected shows a part 



^! of one of the chambers filled with serpentine, which 



|>^*j presents the usual curdled aspect almost impossible 



J to represent in a drawing (s). It is traversed by a 



branching vein of chrysotile (/), which, where cut 



precisely parallel to its fibres, shows clear fine cross 



•>(^ lines, indicating the sides of its constituent prisms, 



and where the plane of section has passed obliquely 

 to its fibres, has a curiously stippled or frowsy ap- 





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