On some Tracks of Terrestrial and Freshwater Animals

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Abstract
T he ancient rock-markings known as “Bilobites,” and afterwards described by D’Orbigny under the name of Cruziana , have long been known, and have proved a fertile source of controversy, some regarding them as plant-remains, and others looking upon them as traces of animals. A host of smaller, but similar markings, such as Rysophycus or simpler forms, as Palæochorda , or the various very constant and symmetrical varieties known as Nereites and Myrianites , or those with a more plant-like outline, as Chondrites , all belong to the same line of inquiry. Few writers on the Cambrian and Silurian rocks have not had to refer to what they called fucoidal markings, or worm-tracks, which often have their importance increased by being the only traces of life in the bed. Throughout the geological series to the present day, similar things are found. But though observations on the tracks made by recent animals had long ago been made by Emmons (American Geology, Pt. vi. 1857), and though Dawson had watched and recorded the various markings produced between tides on the long shores of the Bay of Fundy (Acadian Geology, p. 25), it has remained for Nathorst, in his splendid monograph on “Tracks of Invertebrate Animals” (K. Svenska Vet. Academiens Handlingar, Band xviii. No. 7), to place the whole question on a new footing by his experiments with living marine animals, and his extended observations on recent and fossil forms. The very full bibliography given by him renders it unnecessary to refer more particularly to the various authors

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