376 Gratacap—Eozoonal Lock of Manhattan Island. 
anthophyllite in masses, apparently recently blasted and re- 
moved from their beds of place, with which was seen actinolite 
largely serpentinized. An examination of the hill showed a 
vertical face where Hozoon structure (ophio-calcite) was seen at 
a number of points. It appeared in seam-like bands, expand- 
ing in some places and contracting at others, forming an irreg- 
ular scattered prolongation of parts, varying in grain from fine 
to coarse, the former accompanying an apparent flexure or 
contortion of the original stratum. On the south side of 59th 
street, where the excavations were being made, mentioned 
above, an exposure of the serpentine bed was accessible where 
the ophio-calcite was seen, frequently presenting a seam-like 
appearance, contracting to narrow bands and again developed 
in broader sections, while sometimes it sporadically occupied 
nests or spots enclosed in the surrounding rock. Away from 
these parts the serpentine was fibrous or micaceous. 
Should any one feel disposed to refer these eozoonal-like 
portions (fig. 7) to an organic origin, the extended irregular 
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vein-like parallel strips, which they present, would form a 
seemingly strong objection to such a reference. Coralline 
bodies occur in reefs or reef-like lines, but this mosaic of ser- 
pentine and calcite has nothing coralline about it in any sense, 
and when placed, as it only can be placed, on the assumption 
of its zoological affinities, with the protozoa or metazoa, 1t 
repels all analogies with any thing in those classes of animal 
life, by its linear extent, the actual length of these broken 
strings of ophio-calcite, being in the exposed sections, from 10 
to 20 feet.* 
The films of this “verde antique” are not horizontal, but 
* Tt is true that Professor Hyatt (Science, vol. vi, p. 386) speaks of spongoid 
bodies Archeocyathus, Ethmophyllum, etc., as probably the reef-builders of the 
primordial seas, so that linear extent merely might not preclude the possibility of 
the eozoonal rock being referred to an organic origin. But when in connection 
with their length these eozoonal veins have only a moderate width of a few 
inches their reference to the reef-like masses of sponges seems incredible. 
