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I2S ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



REVIEWS. 



On the Fossil Fish Remains of the Coal Measures of 

 the British Islands. Part I. Pleuracanthidse. By James W. 

 Davis, F.G.S., F.L.S., etc. Trans. Roy. Dublin Soc, ser. ii. vol. iv. 

 pp. 703-748, Plates LXV.-LXXIII. 



This ambitious memoir, consisting of forty-six quarto pages and 

 nine plates, need only occupy us so far as the author's references to 

 Scottish specimens are concerned ; such matters as the remarkable 

 conception of Selachian anatomy involved in the " restoration " of 

 the top of the head of Pleur acanthus being safely left to other 

 periodicals. Mr. Davis enumerates the following species of Pleur- 

 acanthus as occurring in Scottish Upper Carboniferous rocks : 



Pleuracanthus Itzwssimus, Ag. — Shettlestone, near Glasgow. 

 alatus, Davis — Stonehouse,. Newarthill. 

 cylindricus, Ag. — Quarter, Hamilton. 

 Thomsoni, n. sp., Davis — Quarter, Kilmarnock. 

 IVoodwardi, n. sp., Davis — Covvdenfoot, Dalkeith. 

 Taylori (Stock) — Airdrie. 



We may refrain in the meanwhile from expressing any opinion 

 upon the validity of several of Mr. Davis's new species, but we did 

 not expect the rehabilitation of Stock's Taylori, which we had con- 

 sidered long ago safely relegated to the synonymy of PL cylindricus, 

 Ao\ Mr. Davis seeks to identify two Scottish Lower Carboniferous 

 spines with species occurring in the true Coal Measures ; main- 

 taining that PL elegans, Traq., from the Loanhead Ironstone, is 

 identical with the young stage of PL lcevissi?nus, Ag. ; while he also 

 identifies a small spine from the " Better-bed " Coal, Clifton, York- 

 shire, with PL horridulus, Traq., from the same bed as PL elegans. 



It certainly seems to us that Mr. Davis is not yet sufficiently 

 acquainted with the characters of these Scottish spines, else he would 

 not have committed himself to any such identifications. 



Reference is made at the close of the paper to another Scottish 

 Lower Carboniferous spine — Anodontacanthus fastigiatus, Davis — in 

 the following terms : " A single specimen, described as a third 

 species [of Anodontacanthus\ A. fastigiatus, from the Blackband Iron- 

 stone at Loanhead, is considered by Dr. Traquair, who has other 

 specimens, to belong to another genus, and awaits his further decision." 

 Dr. Traquair has, however, so far back as five years ago (GeoL Mag. 

 1888, p. 1 01), expressed his opinion that the " species fastigiatus falls 

 into Pleuracanthus, as that genus at present stands." 



A Fauna of Lakeland. Erratum. — In our review of this book 

 in the January Annals, p. 61, by an oversight it was stated that the 

 Spotted Eagle and the Frigate Petrel were both washed up on Walney 

 Island in the year 1875. We should have said that the Petrel was 

 thus obtained in 1891. 



