XVL HUGH MILLER. 



till after ten years' acquaintance with it that Mr Miller dis- 

 covered it to be richly fossiliferous. The labours of other ten 

 years were required to assign to its fossils their exact place 

 in the scale. 



Among the fossils discovered by our author, the Pterichthys 

 or winged fish is doubtless the most remarkabla He had 

 disinterred it so early as 1831, but it was only in 1838 that 

 he " introduced it to the acquaintance of geologists." It was 

 not till 1831 that Mr Miller began to receive assistance in 

 his studies from without In the Appendix to Messrs Ander- 

 son of Inverness's admirable " Guide to the Highlands and 

 Islands of Scotland," which " he perused with intense inte- 

 rest," he found the most important information respecting the 

 geology of the North of Scotland ; and, during a correspond- 

 ence with the accomplished authors of that work, many of 

 his views were developed and his difficulties removed. In 

 1838 he communicated to Dr Malcolmson of Madras, then 

 in Paris, a drawing and description of the Fterichthys. His 

 letter was submitted to Agassiz, and subsequently a restored 

 drawing was communicated to the Elgin Scientific Society. 

 The great naturalist, as well as the members of the provincial 

 bociety, were surprised at the new form of life which Mr MiUer 

 had disclosed ; and some of them, no doubt, regarded it with 

 a sceptical eye. " Not many months after, however, a true 

 bona fide Pterichthys was turned up in one of the newly-dis- 

 covered beds of Nairnshire." In his last visit to Scotland, 

 Agassiz found six species of the Pterichthys^ three of which, 

 and the wings of a fourth, were in Mr Miller's collection. 



This remarkable animal has less resemblance than any other 

 fossil of the Old Red Sandstone to anything that now exists. 

 When first brought to view by the single blow of a hammer, 

 there appeared on a ground of light-coloured limestone the 

 e^gj of a creature, fashioned apparently out of jet, with a 

 body covered with plates, two powerful- looking arms articu 



