CRITICAL , REMARKS ON A. BITTNER’S *‘ ECHINID= 
EN DES TERTIARS VON AUSTRALIEN.” 
By Proressor Rautpu Tate, F.G.S. 
[Read October 4, 1892. ] 
A reference to the above-mentioned paper, published in the 
Transactions of the “ Kaiser-Kong. Akad. der Wissenschaften 
in Wien,” and read before that Society March 10, 1892, is here 
made partly as a supplement to my communication on the 
Kchinoids of the Australian Eocene in Trans. Roy. Soc. 8. Aust., 
vol. XIV., p. 270, 1891, but more particularly as an illustration 
of the evil of intrusting diagnostic work (except under very 
special circumstances) to external authors, who cannot have that 
thorough knowledge of the mode of occurrence and _ habits of the 
objects which is so essential to exactitude in defining the limits 
of variability of species. 
Last year I despatched to Dr. Stur, as Director of the Im- 
perial Museum of Vienna, a large suite of fossils from the 
Older Tertiary strata of Australia, amongst which were sixteen 
species of echinoids, fairly well represented individually ; this 
material served as the basis of Mr. Bittner’s paper. I exercised 
the greatest care in the selection of the specimens, being desirous 
to forward only those of established species; in the case of 
Psammechinus Woodsi, Paradoxechinus novus, and Fibularia 
gregata the series was fairly large, so as to embrace, in my 
opinion, considerable range of individual variation. Of the small 
number of species sent to the Vienna Museum Mr. Bittner makes 
five additional species, some new varieties, and establishes three 
new genera. His communication has, however, despite the 
forcible effort at species-making, a value by illustrating the 
extent of individual variation of certain common species, and by 
defining minute details of structure which may indicate some 
generic relationships not hitherto recognised; it is, moreover, 
accompanied by four well-executed plates. 
The same author supplies a bibliographic reference which 
was unknown to me, viz:—t. Cotteaw, “ Mem. Soc. Zool. de 
France, 1890,” wherein are described some new or little- 
known echinoids, including some species from our Eocene strata. 
That paper is not yet accessible to me. 
The following additional references are noteworthy. 
