ON THE FOSSIL FISH OF THE DEVONIAN SYSTEM. 81 



class to which they belong. Never shall I forget the impression which 

 the sight of these creatures, provided with appendages resembling wings, 

 produced upon me, when I had assured myself that they belonged to the 

 class of fishes. It was an entirely new type which was about to figure for 

 the first time since it had ceased to exist in the series of beings, — again to 

 form a link which nothing of all that had been revealed up to the time, 

 with regard to extinct creations, would have led us even to suspect the exist- 

 ence of; showing forcibly that observation alone can lead us to the recogni- 

 tion of the laws of development of organized beings, and how much we should 

 guard against all those systems of transformation of species which the ima- 

 gination invents with as much facility as reason refutes them. The merit 

 of the discovery of these curious fossils is chiefly due to Mr. H. Miller, and 

 I had only to fix their characters, and their relations to the fossil fishes al- 

 ready known, for all their importance to be appreciated. I believe that the 

 minute and comparative study of the type which I have called Pterichthys, 

 and of the not less curious genusdiscovered at Caithness by Messrs. Murchison 

 and Sedgwick, and to which I have applied the name Coccosteus, will open to 

 comparative palaeontology a field not less fruitful than was the first announce- 

 ment, now nearly a quarter of a century ago, of the Ichthyosauri and Plesio- 

 sauri. How many interesting relations of organization have we not a right to 

 expect to discover in analysing the solid remains of animals which have been 

 regarded by the most able naturalists successively as Tortoises, Fishes, Crus- 

 tacea, and even Coleoptera ! Mr. Miller has already made known, in a separate 

 publication, a portion of the palseontological treasures contained in the old red 

 sandstone of the neighbourhood of Cromarty. The difficulties, almost insur- 

 mountable, which have occurred in determining fossils, varying so much from 

 those already known as these two genera, have necessarily required on my part 

 numerous and repeated comparisons, and a minute study of the smallest frag- 

 ments preserved in all the collections of Scotland, to which I should have been 

 unable to apply myself, notwithstanding the facilities afforded me for this exa- 

 mination by all the persons possessing any of these fossils, had it not been for 

 the assistance which the British Association has kindly afforded me. 



Among the recent contributions which have so considerably increased our 

 knowledge of the fossil fishes of the Devonian system, I must place in the first 

 rank what has been accomplished by Lady Gordon Cumming in order to il- 

 lustrate this ancient fauna. Not satisfied with collecting and distributing 

 among geologists with unequalled liberality the numerous specimens of these 

 remains, which she had collected in a quarry worked on purpose, she studied 

 them with care, placed aside the most perfect specimens, and painted them 

 with a precision of detail and an artistic talent to which very few naturalists 

 have been able to attain. These drawings, indeed, and those of her daugh- 

 ter, who constantly assisted her in her studies, will form one of the principal 

 ornaments of my ' Monograph.' On the point of presenting this selection to 

 the public, it is painful to me to think that this noble lady will no more be 

 able herself to receive from geologists the tribute of gratitude which she so 

 justly deserved. May this record, planted upon her grave, remind her esti- 

 mable companion that the willingness with which she assisted her parent has 

 contributed to raise for her a lasting monument in the scientific world. 



Dr. Malcolmson has likewise deserved well of the geology of the old red 

 sandstone by the memoir which has been recently inserted in the Transactions 

 of the Geological Society of London. Endeavouring to characterize this 

 formation with the greatest possible precision, he had caused to be made 

 beautiful drawings of a very large number of fragments of fish which occur 

 in it ; their fragmentary state, however, did not allow of my determining 



184.2. g 



