353 

 ,. ,,QnJ^epiilia9i I^emains fonnd in the Old Bed Sandstone \^fn 



1. Notice of the Discover^/ of Reptilian Foot^Wack&^aM''iteifSalk» 

 in the Old lied Sandstone of Morayshire. By Captain Lambert 

 Brickenden, F.G.S. . xnu ;o ^onuri i; ,/iii:^iiiii i- rj.iij <. 

 On the coast of Mornjsbirb,' Hbei^^n tfec'iilla^es'^trf ^Cdresea'and 



-PjATgliead, strata of crybtal line sandstone occur in great thickness, 

 .and are regarded as belonginor to the upper division of the Old Bed 

 or Devonian formation of Scotland. The only fossil discovered in 

 this rock was the imprint of a mass of scales or scutes of a remark- 

 able ganoid fish, named Stagonolepis, by M. Agassiz, until 1850, 

 wlien the author observed on a block of sandstone, in a quarry at 

 .^ummingstoue, a distinct .series of quadrupedal footprints, traced in 

 , an uninterrupted succession acr()ss the slab. The imprints are thirty- 

 four in number, and the track of the riglit feet alternates with that 

 of the left. These impressions have a rounded form, and are identical 

 with those which are generally regarded as chelonian footprints by 

 pala3ontoiogists. In October 1851, from a quarry of sandstone at 

 Spynie Hill, Mr Patrick DuiF, of Elgin, obtained a beautiful imprint 

 of the skeleton of a four-footed reptile, about five or six inches in 

 length, and which that gentleman allowed the author to transmit to 

 Dr Mantell to describe, as an appendix to the present communication. 

 The author states that, on findincj the chelonian foot-tracks in rocks 

 of an age in which no traces of the class Reptilia had previously 

 been discovered, a strict investigation took place as to whether the 

 sandstone strata, from which the slab was taken, are unquestionably 

 referable to the Devonian formation, to which they had always been 

 supposed, by Mr Hugh Miller and other competent observers, to be- 

 long. The discovery of the reptile at Spynie dispelled all doubt on this 

 point ; for the beds of Cummingstone and Spynie are identical, and, 

 at the latter place, are capped by the cherty limestone peculiar to 

 the upper division of the old red of the district. The Stagonolepis^ 

 found in the same rocks, is emphatically an old red sandstone family 

 of fishes, and confirms the above inferences. The author concludes 

 with the remark that, by the discovery of the chelonian footsteps and 

 the reptile of Spynie, we have thus for the first time obtained un- 

 questionable evidence that two orders of the class Reptilia existed 

 during the Devonian epoch. 



2. On the Telerpeton Elginense, a Fossil Reptile discovered in 

 the Old Red Sandstone of Moray. By Mr Patrick Duff ; and 

 on supposed Fossil Ova of Batrachians in the lower Devonian 

 Shales of Forfarshire. By Dr Mantell, LL.D., F.R.S.. &c. 



The reptile from Spynie, referred to by Captain Brickenden in 

 the foregoing paper, consists of the impression of the skeleton in a 



VOL. l.ll. NO. CIV. — APRIL 1852. Z 



