650 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [Dec, 



NOTES ON SOME LITTLE-KNOWN FISHES FROM THE NEW YORK DEVONIAN. 



BY BURNETT SMITH. 



Machceracanthus and other Fish Remains from the Oriskany Sand- 

 stone. — So far as the writer has been able to learn the literature of 

 Paleontology contains no reference to the occurrence of fish remains 

 in the Oriskany sandstone of New York. Beyond the boundaries of 

 the State fossils of this nature have been reported from beds which 

 are believed to be contemporaneous with the type Oriskany. Eastman 1 

 mentions the scales of Thelodus from "Oriskany sandstone" at Nictaux 

 Falls, N. S., while Newberry, 2 in his monograph makes the following 

 statement : " Neither in New York nor farther south has the Oriskany 

 sandstone yet furnished any remains of fishes, but it is to be expected 

 that when sought for patiently and discriminatingly they will be 

 discovered. In Canada, north of Lake Erie, where the characteristic 

 fossils of the New York Oriskany are associated with those of the 

 Corniferous limestone, spines of Machceracanthus and fragments of 

 plates with a stellate tuberculation, probably of MacropetaJiehthys, 

 have been found." 



In the vicinity of Syracuse, N. Y., the presence of bone fragments 

 and of spines in the phosphatic nodules of the Oriskany has been 

 known to local collectors for some time. Several years ago Mr. Charles 

 E. Wheelock, of Syracuse, obtained a spine from one of these concre- 

 tions at Britton's quarry, Onondaga County (just south of the Syracuse 

 city line). This specimen has unfortunately been lost, but the writer 

 feels that he can accept without reserve the determination of so 

 careful an observer as Mr. Wheelock. 



In 1908, Mr. Charles Hares, then a graduate student at Syracuse 

 University, while studying the stratigraphic relations of the Oriskany 

 sandstone, brought to my notice a number of fragmentary fossils 

 from the phosphatic nodules at the quarries east of Manlius, Onondaga 

 County. 



With the exception of a few obscure pieces of bone, some collected 



1 New York State Museum Memoir 10, p. 13. 



2 Monographs U. S. G. S., vol. XVI, p. 25. 



