50 VEKTEBEATA. 



OrnitMchnites. 



S&° The following celebrated Foot-prints, discovered and described 

 by the late Dr. E. Hitchcock, of Amherst, Mass., are popularly known 

 as Bird-tracks, and are therefore entered at this place. Geologists, how- 

 ever, are not assured of their ornithic origin ; many of them are prob- 

 ably reptilian. 



No. 189. Brontozoum giganteum, Hitchcock. 



Four Tracks, on slab. These enormous bird-like footprints belong to a 

 bipedal animal that lived by the shore of an estuary which deposited the sand- 

 stones of the Connecticut Valley. Each track measures fifteen inches in length • 

 every claw and phalange has left its mark, while the trifid termination of the 

 metatarsal bone left three marks more — fifteen in all — the true ornithic number. 

 The stride was thirty-eight inches, so that the same limb was carried out each step 

 nearly seven feet. The animal went forward nearly on a straight line, so that its 

 legs must have been very long." , Hitchcock estimates that it was twelve feet high, 

 and weighed from four hundred to eight hundred pounds. (The Ostrich stands 

 between seven and eight feet high, weighs sometimes one hundred pounds, and 

 its stride is twenty-six inches.) The substratum bent under the enormous weight, 

 and the depth of the impression exceeds two inches. The Brontozoa were prob- 

 ably Scansores like the Ostrich and Dinornis. From the fact that parallel rows of 

 tracks are found a short distance from one another, we infer that they were accus- 

 tomed to frequent in flocks the shores of the sea, to wade in its shallows in quest 

 of mail-covered fishes of the ancient type and long extinct molluscs. These fea- 

 thered giants flourished in the days of the Ichthyosaurus, or at least between the 

 Coal and Jurassic j)eriods. The age of the red sandstone, in which the tracks 

 occur, has not been precisely determined, but it is supposed to be Liassic. This 

 specimen was found near Turner's Falls, Mass., and belongs to the Appleton Cabi- 

 net of Amherst College. Size, 11 ft. 8 in. x 2 ft. Price, $16.00- 



No. 190. Brontozoum giganteum, Hitch. 



Two Tracks, on slab. Stride, nearly four feet. From the same locality 

 and Museum as the preceding. Size, 5 ft. 6 in. x 15 in. Price, $6.00. 



