vni EYES 227 



fixed cheek is small in Phacops, Cheirurus, and Illaenus ; 

 relatively large in Remopleurides, Phillipsia, and Stygina. It 

 was suggested by M'Coy 1 that the free cheek represents the 

 pleura of an anterior segment which has not become fused with 

 the other cephalic pleurae. The fixed cheek appears to be 

 formed of the coalesced pleurae of the other cephalic segments, 

 but of those pleurae the only indication seen in adult specimens 

 is in the neck-ring ; in young specimens of Olenellus, however, 

 the presence of other pleurae is indicated by furrows on the 

 cheeks in front of the neck-furrow. 



A pair of compound eyes are present in the majority of 

 Trilobites. Each eye is situated on the free cheek, at that part 

 of its inner margin where the facial suture bends to form an 

 angle (Figs. 137, A, h, 138). The position of the eye is con- 

 sequently determined by the position of 

 the facial suture ; it may be near the 

 glabella or near the lateral margin of 

 the head, and either as far forward as the 

 first segment of the glabella or nearly as 

 far back as the neck-furrow. In many 

 Trilobites the eye is more or less conical, 



/ ' FIG. 138 Phacops latifrons, 



with its summit truncated or rounded, but Bronn, x i. Devonian, 

 in some genera it is ovoid, or crescentic. 

 In Aeglina (Fig. 150, H) the eye is 

 flattened and scarcely raised above the general level of the cheek. 

 The eye of a Trilobite is oriented so that its longer axis is 

 parallel or nearly parallel to the axis of the body (Fig. 150, G) ; 

 but in one case (Encrinurus intercostatus) it is placed at right 

 angles to this axis. The size of the eye varies considerably ; it 

 is largest in Aeglina, in which it covers nearly the whole of the 

 free cheek ; it is small in Acidaspis and Encrinurus. 



Though the eye is always entirely on the free cheek, the 

 adjoining part of the fixed cheek is raised to form a buttress on 

 which the eye rests ; this buttress, which is known as the 

 " palpebral lobe," is seen clearly when the fixed cheek is removed. 

 The eyes of Trilobites are always sessile ; for although in some 

 species, such as Asaphus cornigerus, A. kowalewskii, and Encri- 

 nurus punctatus, they are on the summits of prominent stalks, 

 yet those stalks are immovable. 



1 Ann. May. Xat. Hist. (2) iv., 1849, p. 396. 



