68 THE PALEONTOLOGY OF MINNESOTA. 
[Anomalospongia. 
Pasceolus Billings (Geological Survey of Canada; Report of Progress for 1857, 
p. 842), may belong to the Receptaculitide, but we are unable to give a definite opinion 
regarding its systematic position. 
ANOMALOSPONGIA, noy. nom. 
ON THE STRUCTURE AND SYSTEMATIC POSITION OF “ANOMALOIDES,” AND 
A PROPOSAL TO CHANGE THE NAME TO ANOMALOSPONGIA. 
BY EH. O. ULRICH. 
The name Anomaloides reticulatus was proposed by me in 1878 in my first contri- 
bution to paleontologic science (Jour. Cin. Soc. Nat. Hist., vol. i, p. 92). Viewed as 
a first effort, some of the errors contained in that paper may be excused, especially 
since none of them are very bad, and the worst not entirely my fault, as I hope to 
show in a paper to be published soon. One error, that in the construction of the 
name Anomaloides, was pointed out by Mr. 8. A. Miller (North Amer. Geol. and Pal., 
p. 224, 1889). I acknowledge the justice of his criticism, and although similarly con- 
structed names are allowed to stand, I think it best, now that the nature of the fossil 
is determined, to change the name. I propose therefore to use Anomalospongia 
instead. The new name retains the principal part of the original designation, and 
the ending spongia denominates the class to which the fossil belongs. Nor is Anom- 
alospongia at all inappropriate, for the specimens now so named are, as will appear 
later on, still to be regarded as anomalous. ; 
The original specimens, 35 in number, were all fragments, some large, most of 
them small, and all found within a space a few feet square in the middle beds of the 
Cincinnati group at Covington, Kentucky. Further search at the same spot resulted 
in a few more fragments, all of them small, and, like many of the originals, con- 
siderably obscured by the adhering clayey matrix. For ten years these specimens 
remained in my cabinet without further examination, I having been under the im- 
pression that their structure had been determined as far as the specimens at hand 
would admit. At last, after the possibility of other affinities than with Echinodermata 
was suggested, a re-examination was determined upon. This time I began with the 
fragments that in my original study were cast aside because of the obscuring matrix. 
Having some experience in cleaning fossils in that condition I succeeded in freeing 
- several fragments of their clayey investment. The result was most gratifying, since 
the cleaned surface showed unquestionably a layer of overlapping spicule rays, prov- 
ing the fossil to belong to the Spongida and not to the Echinodermata. 
! 
