BY PROFESSOR STEPHENS, M.A., F.G.S. 937 



diffident in the matter, and though my own conviction is strong, 

 I feel that others may form very different views. However, the 

 facts are as follows : — All the Mastodonsaurus group of the 

 Labyrinthodonts, and some others, possessed a very curious breast 

 armour, perhaps in compensation for the slight andpoordevelopment 

 of the pectoral arch in the true skeleton. The plates of which this 

 armour or breastplate was formed have often been mistaken for 

 Chelonian remains ; but are remarkably well characterised by the 

 deep, long, and bifurcating or reticulated channels which are 

 ordinarily called muciferous canals. Of these plates they had 

 three — one rhomboidal in shape, medial and posterior, upon the 

 lower portion of the throat, and two lateral and forward, slightly 

 overlapping the medial, and compared by Owen — in Archegosaurus — 

 to the elytra of a beetle. One of these is now, I believe, before 

 you. 



In conclusion I beg to be allowed to quote, from the Memoirs of 

 the Geological Survey of India, a few passages which are certainly 

 curious, and which I think bear out — so far as such evidence can — 

 the identity of our upper coal measures and Hawkesbury with the 

 Damudas of India. We have the same conglomerates, the same 

 false bedding of the sandstone, and now at last the satisfactory 

 declaration of Mastodonsaurus, 



In the report on the Karanpura Coalfield, Mem. Geol. Survey, 

 VII. 3, Mr. Hughes says — of the Upper Damudas, appearing 

 like Panchets — " In many places the rocks have been weathered 

 in the most peculiar manner. Small pinnacles and domes are left 

 here and there, and their whole surface presents the appearance of 

 successive irregular circles of little scallop-shaped recesses." " This 

 weathering is more particularly apparent in those portions of 

 sandstone which stand up prominently in the shape of domes or 

 pinnacles." 



No one who is acquainted with Hassan's Walls, or any similar 

 district on the edge of the Hawkesbury sandstone can fail to see 

 the exactness of this description, if transferred to this country- 



