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For many years these footprints have been referred to a large unknown quadruped, provisionally named Cheirotherium by Professor Kaup, because the marks both of the fore and hind feet resembled impressions made by a human hand. The larger impressions, which seem to be those of the hind foot, are generally eight inches in length, and five in width, and one was twelve inches long.
In like manner, the Amphitragulus elegans of Pomel, an Auvergne fossil, is identified by Waterhouse with Dorcatherium nanum of Kaup, a Rhenish species from Weissenau, near Mayence.
Professor Kaup suggested that the unknown quadruped might have been allied to the Marsupialia; for in the kangaroo the first toe of the fore foot is in a similar manner set obliquely to the others, like a thumb, and the disproportion between the fore and hind feet is also very great.
Konungr bað hirðmenn vera hrausta ok duga nú hvern eptir því, sem hann hefði hug til, ok ráða af óvætt þenna; ok svá var gert, sem konungr bauð, at þeir bjuggu sik til þess. Konungr horfði á dýrit ok mælti síðan: 'enga sé ek fọr á dýrinu, en hverr vill nú taka kaup einn ok ganga í móti því? Bọðvarr mælti: 'þat væri næsta hrausts manns forvitnisbót.
With these are several species of the genus Oreodon, Leidy, uniting the characters of pachyderms and ruminants also; Eucrotaphus, another new genus of the same mixed character; two species of rhinoceros of the sub-genus Acerotherium, a Lower Miocene form of Europe before mentioned; two species of Archaeotherium, a pachyderm allied to Chaeropotamus and Hyracotherium; also Paebrotherium, an extinct ruminant allied to Dorcatherium, Kaup; also Agriochoerus, of Leidy, a ruminant allied to Merycopotamus of Falconer and Cautley; and, lastly, a large carnivorous animal of the genus Machairodus, the most ancient example of which in Europe occurs in the Lower Miocene strata of Auvergne, but of which some species are found in Pliocene deposits.
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