166 Wright and Huxley — Fossil Reptiles from Ireland. 



Coal, alDout three inclies in thickness. Then we find a seam of ex- 

 cellent Coal, about three feet in thickness, known as Stone Coal, 

 which rests on a bad description of a foliated Coal, some fourteen 

 inches in depth. Next is a layer of slaty Coal, nine inches in 

 thickness, called by the miners the "wire sole ; " then a four-inch Coal, 

 under which is a white-coloured slate rock, and a six-inch bed of 

 culm, resting on the " Coal seat." 



The date of the first boring in this pit is 1812. It was first 

 worked successfully in 1827, and continued open until 1832, after 

 which it was not worked until 1853, when it came into the possession 

 of its present proprietor, Mr. S. Bradley. There is some difficulty, 

 from want of positive evidence, in deciding exactly what Coal bed 

 is the one worked in this pit ; but no fossil forms, save those of ferns, 

 had been detected in it, or in the culm, until Mr. W. B. Brownrigg, 

 visiting the pit late in the season of 1864, was struck by the remark- 

 able ajDpearance presented by some of the tail vertebras of a Labyrinth- 

 odont Amphibian, named in this paper TJrocordylus Wandesfordii. 

 Believing it to be of the gi-eatest interest, he collected all the speci- 

 mens of fossils to be found from time to time ; and, in the course 

 of the following year, having mentioned the subject to one of 

 the authors of this paper, a grant of money was obtained, in Sep- 

 tember, 1865, to work the deposit from the British Association. 

 Since then, repeated visits have been paid to the colliery, the pro- 

 prietor of which, and Mr. K, Dobbs, the agent of the property, not 

 only gave every facility for the prosecution of these researches, but 

 aided and assisted them in every possible way, giving the strictest 

 injunction that every specimen found should be properly preserved. 



By such systematic collecting a large series of fossils were very 

 soon brought to light, and perhaps the largest number of specimens 

 were those of many genera of plants, some of which, in all pro- 

 bability, will throw much light on existing genera of coal-plants, 

 and others may eventually prove to be undescribed species. There 

 is also a considerable collection of fish-remains ; spines apparently 

 referable to several species of Gyr acanthus, with several other 

 Elasmobranchs; large specimens, with the singTilar vertebral coluuan 

 wonderfully preserved, of some species of Megalichthys. Another 

 ganoid fish, upwards of four feet in length, and especially provided 

 with strong, long and much curved ribs, a broad head and rounded 

 snout, large opercula, characterised by a raised longitudinal rib, — we 

 refer to a new genus Campylopleuron. But although the plants and 

 fish were both numerous and interesting, the most remarkable dis- 

 covery was that of many novel forms of Labyrinthodont Amphibia; 

 and, leaving the description of the former with that of some few 

 strange forms of invertebrates to be described hereafter, our 

 present object is more particularly to give detailed descriptions, 

 drawn up by Professor Huxley, of the following new genera and 

 species of amphibia. 



1. The genus TJrocordylus is distinguished by the remarkable 

 size and strength of its tail, and by the great development of 



