DEANE’S FOSSIL FOOTPRINTS. 
73 
yet a considerable proportion of the footprints sustain a close resemblance to the feet 
of existing struthious birds. Most of the footprints are tridactylous, a few have a 
fourth toe, and others still are characterized with obscure brushy tarsal appendages. 
But as a general thing the clear unequivocal impressions display three massive toes, 
a massive heel, and three blunt claws. 
Other creatures co-existed with the numerous tribes of birds, but their numbers as 
at present understood were not great. Their footprints indicate animals of inferior 
dimensions as compared with their biped cotemporaries. They are referrible to 
several species of Batrachian and Chelonian reptiles, the former being characterized 
by the great disproportion between the size of the posterior and anterior feet, and the 
latter by their trail. I have elsewhere given drawings of five distinct species of 
batrachian footprints, and the list might be somewhat extended by recent discoveries. 
That multitudes of amphibious and other inferior creatures inhabited the ancient seas 
there is abundant proof, but as the destruction of their organization has been 
complete, our knowledge of their character is very obscure. Fishes abound in the 
new red sandstone; and thus during the deposition of this rock three great classes of 
the animal kingdom were represented, Aves, Pisces, and Reptilia, and the 
presumption is irresistible that the superior class, Mammalia, was contemporaneous. 
The accompanying plates illustrate five undescribed species of ornithic footprints, 
derived from Turner’s Falls. 
Fig. 2, plate VIII, is an elegant impression. The toes are massive and display the 
order of articulation. The outer or long toe is somewhat imperfect at the terminal 
joint. Projecting backward from the toe is a deep circular impression of the outer 
tubercle of the tarso-metatarsal bone ; the central one is embraced by the first joints of 
the lateral toes, while the inner one falls behind the short toe. The same 
arrangement is observed in fig. 1, and thus the aggregate of depressions in good 
examples is fifteen; namely, for the inner toe two, middle three and outer four, 
three for the nails and three for the heel.* Fig. 1 shows this method very clearly. 
It will at once be seen that this footprint is specifically different from that of 
fig. 2. The toes are slender, widely separated, and the foot is much smaller. The 
stride in fig. 2 is fourteen inches, and in fig. 1 it is ten inches. Either of these 
footprints may be taken as a model for comparison, for in each every essential feature 
is accurately impressed. They do not differ materially from manyother impressions; 
still to the practised eye the form of the foot and individual toes, length of stride, &c., 
separate them from all others hitherto discovered. The toes in fig. 2 are extremely 
fleshy and stout, whereas in fig. 1 they are tapering and slight. 
Fig. 3, is a singular impression lately discovered by Mr. Marsh, and added to his 
magnificent collection of sandstone fossils. He believes it to be a palmated foot, but 
♦It rarely happens, however, that the inner tubercle of the tarso-metatarsal bone is impressed. 
