OIRIGi-IISr _A.JL, ARTICLES. 



: *-" 



I. — Fossil Fishes in the Devonian Rocks of North Devon. 



By INKERMANN EOGEES. 



THE Devonian rocks in Devon, like tliose of the Old Bed 

 Sandstone of which, they are the equivalents, have been divided 

 into three groups. Mr. T. M. Hall, 1 writing in 1879, quoted no less 

 than five separate classifications suggested for the beds of North 

 Devon, nor has uncertainty been removed by the conclusions arrived 

 at by geologists since that date. 2 But we may for present purposes 

 take the following as the nearest approach to a generally accepted 

 succession : — 



Upper Devonian 



/Tilton Beds. 

 [Baggy Beds. 



~j Pickwell Down Sandstones. 

 iMc 



^Morte Slates in part. 



Middle Devonian {^ orte S1 f; te ^" P art - 

 Lllfracombe Beds. 



(Hangman Grits. 

 Lynton grits and shales. 

 Foreland grits and shales. 



"While examining the rocks of the Middle and Upper series for fossil 

 plants during the past eleven years (1907-18), the results of which 

 have already in part been published, 3 other discoveries were made 

 incidental to the work of collection of plant remains. Among these 

 the discovery of fossil fish remains seems worthy of special notice. 



The object of this brief note is to describe the discovery of fossil 

 fishes made by the writer in the Pickwell Down Sandstone within 

 a few hundred yards of the junction beds of the Morte Slates. As 

 far as he has been able to ascertain, it is with one exception the only 

 find of such remains made in any of the North Devon rocks classified 

 above as Upper Devonian. The exception is a scale of Holoptychius 



1 T. M. Hall, "Classification of the North Devon Kocks " : Trans. Devon 

 Assoc, vol. xi, pp. 180-90, 1879. 



2 J. B. Jukes, " On the Carboniferous Slate (or Devonian Bocks) and the 

 Old Bed Sandstone of South Ireland and North Devon " : Q.J.G.S., vol. xxii, 

 p. 320, 1866, and his pamphlet, Additional Notes on the Grouping of the 

 Bocks of North Devon and West Somerset (privately printed), Dublin, 1867 ; 

 B. Etheridge, "On the Physical Structure of West Somerset and North 

 Devon" : Q.J.G.S., vol. xxiii, p. 568, 1867; W. A. E. Ussher, "On the 

 Palaeozoic Bocks of North Devon and West Somerset" : Geol. Mag., Dec. II, 

 Vol. VIII, 1881, and "Cornwall, Devon, and Somerset": Jubilee Volume 

 Geol. Assoc, 1910, p. 859 ; J. E. Marr, " On some Effects of Pressure on the 

 Devonian Sedimentary Bocks of North Devon": Geol. Mag., Dec. Ill, 

 Vol. V, 1888 ; H. Hicks, "On the Morte Slates and Associated Beds in North 

 Devon and West Somerset": Q.J.G.S., vol. lii, p. 254, 1896, and vol. liii, 

 p. 441, 1897 ; Bev. G. F. Whidborne, " Preliminary Synopsis of the Fauna of 

 the Pickwell Down, Baggy, and Pilton Beds" : Proc Geol. Assoc, vol. xiv, 

 pt. ix, p. 371, 1896. 



3 Arber & Goode, "On some Fossil Plants from the Devonian Bocks of 

 North Devon" : Proc. Camb. Phil. Soc, vol. xviii, pt. hi, p. 89, 1915. 



