128 PALEOZOIC FISHES OF NORTH AMERICA. 
of evidence. In the excellent exposures at Bedford, Ohio, except milliow 
of Conodonts, having no geological significance, the only fossils found are 
the spines and teeth of three species of Klasmobranchs, Hoplonchus, Orodus, 
and Polyrhizodus. These three genera are characteristic of the Carbonif- 
erous system, and have never been found in the Devonian; but they will 
hardly be accepted as decisive, being specifically new. To solve this 
problem, Mr. M. C. Read and Prof. H. P. Cushing have within the last year 
made diligent search throughout northeastern Ohio for molluscous fossils 
in the Cleveland shale. Their efforts have been reasonably successful, as 
they have found large numbers of four species of Brachiopods, three of 
Lingula and one of Discina. In order to make the specific determination 
of these shells as certain as possible, they were submitted, without informa- 
tion as to their origin, to Prof. R. P. Whitfield, whose accuracy and palzeon- 
tological knowledge are proverbial. He reports them to be Lingula Cuya- 
hoga, Hall; L. melie, Hall; and Discina Newberryi, Hall; all well-known 
species of the Cuyahoga shale (Upper Waverly). The fourth species, not 
identified by Professor Whitfield, is a pointed Lingula, apparently unde- 
scribed, but found in the Bedford shale, which overlies the Cleveland, and 
is full of Waverly fossils. 
The evidence, then, that the Cleveland shale is the basal member of 
the Waverly and a part of the Carboniferous system, as stated in the Ohio 
reports, though not overwhelming, may be considered as satisfactory. 
Prof. Edward Orton, the present State geologist of Ohio, has in several 
of his recently published papers united the Cleveland, Erie, and Huron 
shales, and called them collectively the Ohio shale. This seems to me 
unwarranted, as these strata are essentially distinct in their fossils, and the 
upper and lower members of the trinity are separated on the eastern border 
of the State by an interval of at least one thousand feet. It is true that in 
western New York and Pennsylvania the rocks which represent the Huron 
and Erie shales of Ohio, viz, the Genesee shale, the Cashauqua shale, the 
Gardeau shale, the Portage sandstones, and the Chemung group are sufli- 
ciently distinct to be separately recognized and to receive different names. 
But in passing westward into Ohio they are found to thin and blend until 
they ultimately form two distinct strata; the upper—as we know by the 
