72 ■ SIE WILLIAM DAWSON ON 



The earliest known Carboniferous Millipede was Xi/lohius Sigillarice, discovered by the 

 author in ÎTova Scotia in 1858, and described in the Journal of the Geological Society in 

 1859. Since that time numerous species of these animals have been found in the Carbon- 

 iferous and Devonian of Europe and America, and, in so far as Canadian species are concerned, 

 have been described by Scudder and Matthew. 



The first known Palœozoic land snail was that found by Lyell and myself at the South 

 Joggins, in Nova Scotia, in 1851.' This form of land life has since been recognized in 

 other coal regions in America, and in the Devonian plant beds of St. John, but not as yet in 

 Europe.^ 



In the group of Arachnidans, both spiders and scorpions were found in Palœozoic beds 

 in Europe before they were recognized in America 



The circumstance that Canada has been so fortunate in these discoveries, along with 

 the dispersed condition of the descriptions of our Palaeozoic air-breathers, renders it appro- 

 priate that a list of them should appear iu our Transactions, with references to the publica- 

 tions in which they have been described, and to their localities, discoverers, and dates of 

 discovery and description. 



The known land animals of the Palaeozoic in Canada may be summed up as follows : — 



Vertebrata, 26 species ; all Amphibia. 



Arthropoda, 33 species ; viz., Insects, Scorpions, Myriapods. 



Ifollusca, 5 species, Pulmonate Snails. 



Four of the vertebrate species are named for the first time in this paper — two from 

 osseous remains and two from footprints. 



The bibliography given on the following pages refers only to original descriptions and 

 figures, and to later papers supplementary thereto. More full lists of references for the 

 Arthropod species will be found in Scudder's Index to Fossil Insects, Bulletin Geol. Survey 

 United States, No. 71, 1891. The type specimens of most of the vertebrates, and several of 

 the other species, have been placed in the Peter Rcdpath Museum, of McGill University. 



I. VERTEBRATA. 



Up to the present time no evidence of the existence of air-breathing vertebrates has 

 been recognized older than the base of the Carboniferous system, though it is not impossible 

 that some of the fishes of the Devonian may have been endowed with a swimming-bladder 

 capable of being used as an imperfect lung, in the manner observed in modern Dipnoi and 

 Ganoids. Independently of the inference from general structure, the conditions of life in 

 inland waters abounding in vegetable debris would render this probable. The pectoral fins 

 of some Erian and Carboniferous fishes also show points of advance in their bony structure 

 which may have been connected with the habit of creeping in shallow water. No animals, 

 however, endowed with limbs capable of locomotion on land and with the correlated struc- 

 tures of trunk and skull have as yet been recognized in beds older than the Carboniferous. 

 We may, however, hope yet to find land vertebrates in the Devonian, as the conditions seem 

 to have been suitable to them. 



All the air-breathing vertebrates known in the Carboniferous proper are referred to the 



' Journal of Geological Society of London, Vol. IX., p. 5S, 1853. 



2 Dawson, Revision of Palseozoic Land Snails, American Journal of Science, Vol. XX., 1880, p. 405. 



