159 



mind that the learning and skill of Professor Westwood, an 



Entomologist of world-wide reputation, was, undoubtedly, 



of the greatest assistance in the determination of the species, or 



of the orders, to which they belonged, of many of the specimens 



obtained from the Purbecks and the Lias. 



Foreign Strata. 



Europe. 



The Rocks of this period on the Continent, with theexception 



of the Solenhofen slate, and the Lias of the Swiss Alps, have not, 



as before stated, as yet produced any quantity of insect remains. 



Cretaceous. 



The Cretaceous system has as yet produced but very few fossil 



insects. Professor Pictet alludes to some indistinct impression of 



insects in the Schists of Claris. Dr. Geinitz has called attention 



to the remains of perforated wood in the upper and lower 



greensand, of Saxony, which appear to him to be evidence of the 



existence of Longicom beetles during this epoch. He has referred 



the insects, which he believed to have made these perforations, to 



the Ceramhyddm. Professor Pictet further says that M. 



Desmoulins found certain elytra of Coleoptera in the chalk marl of 



the mountain of St Catherine, near Rouen. 



Upper Oolite. 



Solenhofen Slate. 



The most celebrated formation of this period from which 



fossil insects have been obtained in any number, is that of the 



well knowm lithographic stone of Solenhofen in Bavaria (before 



referred to), belonging to one of the upper divisions of the Oolite. 



Of this formation Sir Charles Lyell observes that, " although the 



number of testacea in this slate is small and the plants few, and 



those all marine, Count Munster had determined no less than 237 



species of fossils, including 26 species of insects. These insects, 



among which is a LibeUula, or dragon fly, must have been blown 



out to sea, probably from the same land to which the flying 



lizards and other contemporaneous reptiles resorted." The 



oldest account of fossil insects from this formation is found in 



