GIANTS AND PIGMIE8. 



It 



Hall, Lingulcn, Oraptolites (moiioprionidoan and diprionidean), 

 Trilohites, and aasociutes of No. 4, dUcovered by myself and 

 assistant, Andrew Jack, in 1872.* 



Turning to the west of the station we cone to Pnrdy's 

 Sandstone Quarry. In the flags we see a fern indicating 

 vegetation. We observe rain-prints. Robinson Crusoe like, we 

 sue foot-prints in the sand (stone.) We look at thc^m wonderingly. 

 Some are deep but distinct, — here the sand has been soft. 

 Others are not so deep, and surronndcl with rain-prints. Yet 

 others are more slight, but slill distinct on sun-cracked sand. 

 Similar appearances may now be observed around Truro, 

 Kentville, &c., in the deposits of *' marsh mud." The foot- 

 steps are not pigmean. Tiiey are made by the feet of 

 reptiles of considerable sizes. Similar foot-prints have r)een 

 named Smiropus (lizard-foot) The print of a crcf-odile or 

 alligator's foot might be so named, as they too are " oaurians " 

 or of the lizard class. Farther west, at Kiver Phillip, other 

 flagstones were quarried on which wero numerous Saurian 

 foot-prints. Some of these were of monstrous size — the tracks 

 of giants. In our Museum, in addition to the Wentworth 

 foot-prints, we have two slabs from River Philip of a very 

 interesting character. One has a doul>le row of foot-prints 

 with the trail of a tail intervening, showing that the animal was 

 a lizard (?) The other has a print on a fern-frond, showing a 

 fern as lying in its way when the Saurian was taking its walk. 



At the time when these creatures lived and moved, the 

 Cobequid range of mountains was a long island about 5 or 6 

 miles wide, having the seas of the Lower Carboniferous Period 

 reaching to the vicinity of the site of the Iron Works on the 

 south and to the sepulchres of the Silurian pigmies on the 

 north. 'The coal of Cumberland and Pictou had then no 

 existence, and Prince Edward Island was yet of the future. 



0, My late friend, Prof. Jukes, in his introduction to a 

 Geological paper, thus remarked, ** Demosthenes, when asked 

 what were the requisites for an orator, replied. Action ! action ! 



^ Prof. Hall agrees with me on the question ot Age (Hudvon River or Cinoin'.ifttl, 

 U. 8.). 



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