1865.] GRAPTOLITES OF THE QUEBEC GROUP. 45 



and communicating with a common canal, should offer a convincing 

 argument against these bodies being other than polyp-bearing 

 skeletons. But in following the extensive series of forms now 

 presented to us, we have much evidence to show that some of these 

 were attached to the bed of the ocean, or to other bodies ; while 

 the greater proportion of the species and genera appear to have 

 never been attached to the sea-bottom. 



It may not be easy to determine precisely the family to which 

 these graptolitic forms should be referred ; nor is it certain that 

 the extensive series now presented can all properly be referred to a 

 single family. General Portlock has suggested that these bodies 

 may constitute " several genera belonging even to more than one 

 order."* That they are true Polypi, I believe we shall be able to 

 show, both from analogies already established by various authors, 

 and also from their mode of development or reproduction as 

 exhibited in some of the species. 



The specimens which have usually been observed or represented 

 are simple disconnected stipes, doubtless the dismembered or frag- 

 mentary portions of fronds, which, presenting in the different 

 species great varieties of form and aspect when entire, are never- 

 theless composed of. parts so similar that these fragments, though 

 indicating specific differences, offer little clue to a knowledge of 

 the entire form. 



The name Graptolitlius was established by Linnaeus in the first 

 edition of his " Systema Naturce," 1736, and applied by him to 

 the straight or curved forms which are serrated (celluliferous) upon 

 one side only, of which G. Sagittarius has been regarded as the 

 type.f The propriety of this term is more readily perceived in 

 its application to the fragments of the stipes of monoprionidian 

 forms than to the central portions of the body of the same. In 

 the spirally-enrolled forms, or those with four or more stipes unit- 

 ing in the central disc, as well as in the variously-branching forms, 

 the analogy is not so perceptible. 



1. The Solid Axis. — All the graptolites proper have been found 

 to be provided with a slender solid axis,J while this feature has 



* Geological Report on Londonderry, &c, p. 318. 



f I shall elsewhere endeavor to show that G. scalaris is a diprionidian 

 form exhibiting only one margin. 



t In those species with a single series of cellules, M. Barrande has as- 

 certained that this axis is solid and cylindrical, its diameter not exceed- 

 ing 5 millimetre, and its structure apparently fibrous. (Graptolites de 

 Bo/ieme, page 4.) 



