F. R. Cowper Reed — Salter's Undescrihecl Species. 341 



McCoy figured and described in his Synopsis). The date 1861 

 appears to point to Salter having created the genus Favospongia in 

 that year, and the reference to McCoy's figures of an " undetermined 

 fossil " that he applied the name to this form. But Dr. Hinde has 

 not been able to find out to what "M.G.S., p. 136" refers, and 

 the designation of the fossil as Favospongia Buthveni does not seem 

 to have appeared in print before the name Pasceolus Goughi. 



Six specimens. Dr. Hinde informs me, in the Geological Society's 

 Museum, Burlington House, are mounted on one tablet and labelled 

 " Favospongia Buthveni, Salter; Upper Ludlow Eock, Benson Knot," 

 but the writing is not in Salter's hand. Another tablet with a single 

 specimen is marked (apparently in the same handwriting as the 

 other) " Favospongia (a sponge), Upper Ludlow, Kendal, Professor 

 Sedgwick, Figd. in Synopsis." The specimen in the Jermyn Street 

 Museum entered as • sponge ' in the Catalogue (loc. cit.) is inscribed 

 ou the back "Collected by Euthven from Upper Ludlow at Benson 

 Knot," and Dr. Hinde informs me that it is the same form as that 

 named Favospongia Buthveni in the Geological Society's Museum. 

 Unfortunately nothing further is known about this Jermyn Street 

 specimen. 



Finally, Dr. Hinde has kindly compared the Cambridge specimens 

 labelled Pasceolus Goughi with, these in London, and states that 

 there is no doubt that they are identical, and that it is the same 

 form to which the two names Pasceolus Goughi and Favospongia 

 Buthveni have been given. 



As to the correct generic name to adopt, Dr. Hinde is of the 

 opinion that "both are alike unsuitable, for Favospongia implies 

 that it is a sponge, which in my opinion it is not; and Pasceolus 

 that it belongs to Billings' genus, and this again is highly doubtful, 

 though less improbable than its sponge affinities." Dr. Hinde 

 writes further that on comparison with genuine specimens of 

 Billings' Pasceolus collected from Anticosti, he does not think that 

 F. Buthveni=P. Goughi should be included in Billings' genus. 



It appears to me advisable to adopt the generic name Favospongia 

 in preference to Pasceolus, firstly, because it does not commit one 

 to identifying this form with Billings' genus, to which it appears 

 that it does not probably belong ; and secondly, because the name 

 Favospongia, in spite of its objectionable suggestion of affinity with 

 sponges, has not been applied to any other fossil,^ and is practically 

 a new name including only this one species. The specific name 

 Goughi, having appeared in print before that of Buthveni, must, 

 however, be adopted. We must wait for further knowledge of the 

 structure of this form to determine its true affinities, and if it has 

 ultimately to be assigned to some previously established genus the 

 name Favospongia must be dropped. For the present, however, it 

 serves the useful purpose of designating a peculiar fossil which 

 cannot be placed with certainty in any well-defined genus. The 

 description of its characters is necessarily meagre. 



^ Zittel in his Handbook of Palseontology does not give it. 



