BY R. J. TILLY A RD. 077 



fact that nothing was known of it there. I wrote, therefore, to 

 the British Museum authorities for information, and was in- 

 formed that the fossil had undoubtedly been returned by Dr. 

 Woodward to the Queensland Geological Survey Collection; where 

 it was ultimately found, without a label, in an accumulation of 

 odd specimens. 



The rock-specimen, on which a number of fragments of AnccJla 

 are plainly visible, is hard, dark greyish-brown, and moderately 

 finel}' grained. The dragon fly- wing lies upon a fairly even plane 

 of fracture, and has its apical third, or a little more, and also a 

 small piece of the broad anal area at the base, cut off by two 

 parallel fractures of the rock running obliquely across the wing. 

 Unfortunately, a further irregularity in the fracture-plane has 

 extended up from the posterior margin near the base, well into 

 the middle of the wing, and has thus removed a considerable 

 amount of the interesting area lying below the triangle, as can 

 be seen in the photographs on Plate xlii. 



The description and figure given by Dr. Woodward, in 1884, 

 may be described as broadly accurate, as far as the requirements 

 of the day were supposed to go, with the exception of a few mis- 

 statements which should have been avoided, even by one who 

 claimed no special knowledge of Dragonfly Wing- Venation. For 

 instance, in describing the main veins or "nervures" of the 

 anterior border of the wing, we are told that the "costal 

 nervure," the "sub-costal," and the "median" (in modern termin- 

 ology, C, Sc, and R) "pass along the anterior border until they 

 reach the '"iiode^' or cubital point"; after passing which, only 

 the two anterior ones "are continuous to the extremity of the 

 wing, and support the pterostigma. ' Now this is not true of 

 any Dragonfly, for it is, in every case, the^v*'^ and third of these 

 veins (C and H) that run past the nodus and support the ptero- 

 stigma. Further, in the fossil under discussion, it is less than 

 ever true, for it is easily seen that, in this case, all three of these 

 veins appear to pass the nodus, and Woodward's own figure 

 shows them so doing. Again, it is somewhat puzzling to be told, 

 on p. 3 38, that the fossil is "perhaps referable to the subfamily 



