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demand attention, from the great probability of their having formed 
the inferior termination of the trunk of the lily encrinus. His at- 
tention was first drawn to these bodies by the accounts which he 
received from a quarry-man at Asseburg, who had been employed by 
him in the search for fossils in those quarries. From him he learnt 
that there had frequently been found, in those quarries, irregularly 
formed roundish bodies, of the size of a fist, from which the stems 
of entrochites stuck out like so many fingers ; but which, not being 
heeded by the quarry-men, were consequently lost. Rosinus did not, 
however, rest until he had obtained a sufficient number of specimens 
to enable him to form a tolerable judgment as to the nature of these 
bodies. 
The only specimen which I have been able to obtain of this fossil 
is that which is represented Plate XIV. Fig. 4. This specimen is formed 
by two series of trochite, or by two entrochi, the one twined round 
the other, and both closely united by a spathose matter. Various 
similar masses are figured by Rosinus, Tab. X. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, who 
considers them as the roots or beginnings ( exordia ) of the trochitae, 
belonging to some unknown crustaceous selenitic body, or rather to 
some hitherto unknown species of sea-star, which he supposes to be 
characterized by this spathose suffusion.* Harenberg, who, although 
apprised of the discoveries of Rosinus, believed the encrinus to be a 
marine plant, necessarily concluded that this plant was attached by a 
root, which he supposed to be formed of trochitae of the smallest order, 
and gives a representation of three masses, similar to those described 
by Rosinus, marking them as roots consisting of trochitae. -f- 
Others had regarded these masses rather as concretions of coralline 
bodies; but it is justly observed by Mr. Walch, that the crenulated 
articulations of these bodies, which are peculiar to the encrinites, 
and which are never to be observed in corals, plainly point out to which 
class these bodies belong. 
* Tentam. de Lithozois, P. 81. 
•f- Encrinus seu Liliam Lapideum, P. 7. 
