Fossil Remains, 89 



latter state many traces are to be found in the quarry ; but 

 when the surface had begun to dry, the foot-marks impressed 

 on it would remain a considerable time quite distinct and 

 well defined. Now, supposing the stormy monsoon again 

 to commence, the neighbouring sands, which had not yet 

 been fixed by any mixture of clay, and which happened, from 

 their situation, to be easily dried by a few days of favora- 

 ble weather, would be suddenly drifted on the hill in ques- 

 tion, forming a layer which may easily have covered over the 

 half-indurated surface, without being incorporated with it, 

 and without in any way injuring the form of the footsteps 

 imprinted on it. Let the monsoon be now supposed to con- 

 tinue during the whole course of a dry summer : Fresh lay- 

 ers of sand would be drifted, pure at first, but mingled again 

 towards the close of the season with the clayey dust swept 

 from an arid soil, which mixture would form the materials 

 of what the quarry-men know in its present state by the 

 name of a clay-face^ and would once more, when subjected 

 to the operation of the returning period of rain, both fix the 

 sand, and prepare it for the reception of permanent impres- 

 sions of the tracks of wandering animals. Thus from year 

 to year the same round would be continued, and the same 

 appearances would take place, till, after the revolution of 

 many ages, what was originally sand would be converted, 

 by a common process of nature, into sandstone and being 

 exposed, in common with the rest of our globe, to those 

 mighty but mysterious convulsions of which there are every 

 where such incontrovertible proofs, would at last, by the 

 submersion of the universal deluge, be buried under its pres- 

 ent covering of soil. — Dr. Brewster''s Jour, for April, 1828. 



The following jeu d'esprit from Newton's Journal for April 1828, may 

 amuse our readers, without invalidating the very interesting discovery to 

 which it alludes. — Ed. of this Journal. 



Fossil Remains. — It will be remembered that the Rev, 

 Mr. Buckland distinguished himself a few years ago, by dis- 

 covering a cave at Kirkdale, which he proved to be the din- 

 ing room of antediluvian hyenas, that had in this retreat 

 feasted upon elephants and water-rats, and left nothing but 

 the teeth of these tit-bits, just as records of their good living, 

 and bones of contention for future naturalists and cosmo- 

 gonists. The same ingenious gentleman has lately had the 



Vol. XV.— No, 1. 12 



