692 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



The bituminous shells of Albert and Westmorland counties, 

 British Columbia, which are extensively worked for commercial 

 purposes, contain certain layers abounding in remains of fishes 

 of the family Palceoniscidce. These Albert Shale fishes, according 

 to an elaborate account by Dr. L. M, Lambe, published in 

 Contributions to Canadian Palceontology, vol. iii. No. 3, appear 

 to have lived in lagoons, cut off to a great extent from the 

 sea ; and the abundance of their remains in some of the layers 

 can be explained only by occasional destruction on a wholesale 

 scale. With the exception of an Elonichthys, none of the 

 species recorded by Dr. Lambe is new. In the Monographs of 

 the Palaeontological Society for 1910 Dr. R. S. Traquair con- 

 tinues his account of the Palceoniscidce of the British 

 Carboniferous. 



Remains of fishes from the Devonian of New York are 

 described by Mr. B. Smith in the Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. 

 Philadelphia, 1900, pp. 6^6-^1. They include spines of 

 Machceracanthus and a skull of Dinichthys. 



The last paper for notice, published in Festschrift zum 

 sechzigsten Geburtstage R. Hertwigs, Jena, 1910, vol. ii. pp. 611-22, 

 is one by Dr. E. Stromer on the dentition of the Lepidosirenidc^ 

 and the distribution of Tertiary and Mesozoic lung-fishes. In 

 the second part of this article the author refers to the occurrence 

 of remains of Tertiary lung-fishes allied to Protoptertis in dis- 

 tricts considerably to the north of the present habitat of that 

 genus, and discusses their bearing on the theory of a former 

 land-connection between Africa and South America. In noticing 

 the former range of Ceratodns in space. Dr. Stromer observes 

 that palaeontology furnishes no clue as to the relationship 

 between the Lepidosirenidce and Ceratodontidce. 



