MACKIE — ON FOSSIL BIRDS. 



419 



which seem to grow and increase from moisture and springs, we have 

 already sufficient information conveyed to us by Vernherus ; we may, 

 nevertheless, add here some facts deserving of notice which we have 

 retained in our recollection. Amongst others, whilst the salt destroys 

 common iron, there have been iron -implements and wood discovered 

 after having been left for years in it. In a certain place there was a 

 hen found which, together with her eggs, had been buried iu salt and 

 was thus preserved, and is still exhibited uncorrupted." 

 The Latin text is given below : — 



" Salis Natura quce vegetatur et crescit in Transylvania. — Salis vero 

 scissilis ac montani naturam ex humore aut succo id genus aliquo vegetari, 

 ac crescere, satis quiclem fidem facit idem Vernherus ; nec minus ex nos- 

 tris prseclari aliqui testes, qui multa mihi hac in parte memorata digna 

 retulere, qua? referam. Inter alia vulgare fere dum sal exciditur, relicta 

 elapsis annis instrumenta ferrea, ac ligna in eis reperiri. Quodam loco 

 gallina cum ipsis ovis incubans reperta est, quss eo obductasale servata est, 

 ac incorrupta etiam nunc ostenditur. J am magna ex eis fodinis carbonum 

 vis erui so-let cum sale et vetustissimse roboris trabes. Sal gennneus, qui 

 lucidior est omni sale, cum in fundo reperitur, indicium fodientibus est 

 inferius nullum esse salem, aut impuram terram, ceu matricem reperiri. 

 Abundat et vicina Polonia hujus generis nativo sale saxeo in syncero 

 tamen, ac magis solido." 



The quotation which follows is from the work of Joh. Dan. Ma- 

 joris, Phil, et Med. D., ' Dissertatio Epistolica de Cancris et Ser- 

 pentibus Petrefactis, ad Don. D. Philippum Jacobum Sachs a Le- 

 wenheimb. Medicum in Rep. Patria Vratislaviensi, cui accessit Be- 

 sponsoria Dissertatio Historico-Medica ejusdem Philippi Jacob i 

 Sachs a Lewenheimb. Phil, et Med. D. et Collegii Naturae Cu- 

 riosorum Colleges de Miranda Lapidium Natura,' p. 38. — Jena3, 

 1664 :— 



" In the meantime w r e are certain that not only crabs (river- and 

 sea-crabs), but also serpents, lizards, sea-urchins, star-fishes, scallops, 

 cockles, oysters, shell-fish, clams, limpets, tellens and turbines, and 

 vertebrae and spines of fishes, as well as beaks of birds and parts of 

 other animals, as, for instance, teeth, nails, vertebrae, skulls, etc., 

 through natural as well as artificial causes, are often encountered 

 in the depths of the mountains and in the most hidden recesses 

 of the earth, where neither man nor any other animal could ever pe- 

 netrate; nay, they are sometimes discovered even in the very middle 

 of marbles, that show not the slightest fissure, their bodies, either 

 previously petrified or in their natural state, having. been, so to say, 

 buried in the abyss of the earth, at the occurrence of the Deluge 

 or by some other cause, and which remaining there have acquired 

 the hardness of stone, as might easily occur through the infiltration 

 of saline springs penetrating through every portion of the earth. 

 We observe also on ancient walls nitrous water oozing through and 

 coagulating into w r hite icicles of a conical form." 



The original runs — 



" Credamus interim non cancros solum, sive marinos, sive fluviatiles, sed 



