38 
EXTINCT MONSTERS 
accompanied them. They appear more as the tracks of animals 
passing at once across some tide-receded estuary, in pursuit of 
some well-known and favourite grounds which were periodically 
sought after for some particular purpose. But it must be borne in 
mind that the impressions figured in this important work are not 
all similar in shape, and were probably due to different animals. 
They often show the effects of a peculiar pushing-back motion, 
which may be noticed in living tortoises. Dean Buckland, who ! 
was interested in these impressions, caused a living tortoise to 
I 
walk on soft sand, clay, and paste, and found a fairly close i 
correspondence between the tracks thus made and those of | 
Corncockle Muir. | 
In 1831, Mr. Poulett-Scrope, an English geologist, described j 
some small tracks made by a crustacean on a rock of the Jurassic .. 
period, known as the Forest Marble. If j 
Some years previous to 1856, a series of strange impressions ||| 
was found in a quarry in the lowest part of the Millstone Gritj,'| 
formation at Ehodes Wood, near Tintwhistle, Cheshire. The || 
proprietor, Mr. Ehodes, was much struck with them, from the || 
fact that they bore a resemblance to the marks of a human foot. 
The workmen also were struck with the resemblance, and, when || 
they first showed him the impressions, remarked, Master, 
some one has been here before us 1 ’’ For several weeks the || 
quarry was visited by many hundreds of people from Glossoplq 
and the surrounding neighbourhood. The common opinion was|;'|j 
that the tracks were the footprints of some of Noah’s family ! M|| 
This strange idea seems to have been founded on another equally ||! 
strange, viz. that the Ark had rested on some neighbouring hills. |j| 
But to return to the tracks ; the distance between the impres- |) j 
sions was two feet ten inches, and several of the impressions || 
at ' 
were thirteen inches long. Mr. Waterhouse Hawkins saw them, |) 
