258 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [vOL. 45 



printed before Mr. Ulrich had been asked to revise the chapter on 

 the Bryozoa. When the manuscript for the latter was submitted, 

 the author and the editor objected to the dupHcate treatment of the 

 Monticuhporoids, but withdrew their objection when Mr. Ulrich 

 presented satisfactory evidence of the correctness of his classification. 



In this connection it may be well to state also that, in the opinion 

 of the writers, no valid objection to the reference of the Monticu- 

 hporoids and Fistuliporoids to the Bryozoa has ever been made. 

 None of the recent critics on Lindstrom's, Rominger's, and Ulrich's 

 reference of these fossil organisms with the Bryozoa is deemed of 

 sufficient importance to demand serious attention. As to Waagen 

 and Wentzel,^ they appear to have known little of the American 

 literature on the subject. Had they been better informed also con- 

 cerning the wonderful abundance and variety of the Monticuhporoids 

 and related organisms in American Paleozoic deposits, it is scarcely 

 probable that they would have based a new classification on a very 

 small collection of poor specimens. 



Many facts bearing upon the relations of the Monticuhporoids 

 to the later Bryozoa have come to light since the publication of the 

 American Paleozoic Bryozoa by Ulrich in 1882. At some future 

 time we shall marshal these facts in the hope that their publication 

 may finally fix the position of these disputed forms. 



In the present series of papers the efforts of the authors are 

 directed primarily to the consideration of the generic groups, and 

 in only one order, the Ctenostomata, a relatively small group con- 

 sidered in this paper, are all the known species considered. 



Order CTENOSTOMATA Busk. 



The earliest notice of the Paleozoic fossils, which seem now to 

 be very generally accepted as imperfect remains of ancient repre- 

 sentatives of Ctenostomatous Bryozoa, was by Nicholson and 

 Etheridge, Jr., in 1877. In that year these acute observers published 

 a paper in the Annals and Magazine of Natural History entitled 

 " On Ascodictyon, a new Provisional and Anomalous Genus of 

 Paleozoic Fossils." Three species of the new genus were described 

 and well illustrated in this paper, namely, Ascodictyon stellatinn and 

 A. fusiforme from the Hamilton shales at Widder, Ontario, and A. 

 radians from the Lower Carboniferous limestone of Scotland. 



In discussing the systematic position and affinities of these species, 

 the authors say that specimens were submitted to several authrrities 



^ PalcEontologica Indica, series xiii, \i 



