^% Human Foot-Prints in Solid Limestone. 



may be inferred from the following communication from a gen- 

 tleman now residing here, to whom I am indebted for many val- 

 uable additions to my geological cabinet, and who visited and 

 critically examined the specimen sixteen years ago, in company 

 with several distinguished naturalists : 



" In reply to your inquiries regarding the now famous lime- 

 stone slab with its human foot-prints, I have to say, that in the 

 year 1826, I visited and examined it repeatedly and minutely, 

 and have a perfectly distinct recollection of its appearance at that 

 time. I then compared the foot-prints with my own, placing my 

 naked foot on the impressions. They corresponded very accu- 

 rately both in outline and in the depressions, answering to the 

 principal muscles of the foot and toes, except that the toes were 

 somewhat more widely spread than mine. Mr. Maclure, Dr. 

 Troost, Mr. Say and Mr. Lesueur, then residents of Harmony, 

 examined the rock at the same time. They all agreed in opinion 

 as to the artificial origin of the tracks, with good reason, I think ; 

 for the task seems to me more easy than the fabrication of many 

 of our native vases and other antiquities. 



" I can say with confidence that there is no perceptible differ- 

 ence between the appearance of the tracks nov/ and in 1S26, 

 when I first saw them ; and I find that others who were then in 

 the habit, like myself, of seeing the specimen daily, coincide with 

 me in this opinion. Samuel Bolton." 



Though Messrs. Maclure, Say, Troost, and Lesueur, appear thus 

 to have agreed as to the artificial origin of these foot-prints, yet 

 among the various writers who have broached the subject, others 

 have expressed a very different opinion. 



Mr. Schoolcraft, in the article already referred to, and which 

 first introduced the matter to the scientific world, expresses his 

 unqualified conviction that they are true fossils — the actual im- 

 pressions of human feet made in the rock at some remote period, 

 when it was soft enough to receive them. Here is his description 

 of the foot-prints, and of the rock containing them, together with 

 his reasons for the above opinion : 



" The prints are those of a man standing erect, with his heels 

 drawn in and his toes turned outward, which is the most natural 

 position. The distance between the heels, by accurate meas- 

 urement, is six and one fourth inches, and between the toes 

 thirteen and a half inches ; but it will be perceived that these 



