506 Notices of Memoirs — Prof. Qaudry — 



rounded and open. The "body consists of five unequal-sized calcareous 

 plates closely soldered together, and having their surface covered 

 with small granulations. The plates are each slightly convex, and 

 the lines of the sutures well defined. The species appeared to me 

 to be identical with one of the forms figured by M. Deslongchamps 

 in the memoir referred to from the Middle Lias of May. 



Without committing myself to any opinion as to the true position 

 of Cotylederma in the zoological series until I have an opportunity 

 of examining the structure more in detail, I desire now only to 

 record the fact of the discovery of this genus in the Middle Lias of 

 Dorset, as it is the first English specimen of this curious form of 

 the Liassic Sea which I have yet seen in any collection from our 

 Lias beds. 



1TOTICES OIF 1 IMIIEIMIOIIEaS. 



I. — On the Discovert or Batrachia in the Upper Paleozoic 

 Rocks op France. Sur la decouverte de Batraciens dans le 

 terraine prirnaire, par HI. Albert Gaudry. ;?,Bulletin de la Societe 

 Geologique de France, 3 e serie, t. iii. p. $99, pi. vii. et viii. 



IN the spring of the present year M. Albert Gaudry communicated 

 an interesting paper to the Geological Society of France, on 

 some newly discovered remains of true Batrachia found in the older 

 rocks of that country, and which paper has just been published, 

 with two plates, in their Proceedings. This discovery is palseontolo- 

 gically important ; as the author observes that up to the present 

 time no remains of actual typical Batrachia have, been found in any 

 rocks of earlier date than the Tertiary Period. It has also been 

 "a subject of surprise, that Vertebrates of so low an organization 

 should have appeared so late upon the earth, and this supposed fact 

 has been used as an objection to the theory of progressive develop- 

 ment. However, this discovery, he thinks, shows structural cha- 

 racters, such a,s an evolutionist would expect to find in an ancient 

 rock. The tail very short, the bones of the trunk and limbs 

 resembling those of the Salamanders, whilst on the contrary the 

 bones of the head have the characters of those of the Frog; thus 

 lessening the distance which appears to separate the Urodela from 

 the Anoura. He further remarks, that the incomplete ossification of 

 the centra of the vertebrae, the want of ossification of the epyphyses 

 of the limb bones, and probably, also, the cartilaginous state of the 

 carpals and tarsals, reveal a type of which the evolution is not yet 

 completed. Like the earlier Mammalia, these Batrachia are very 

 small, thus giving them the appearance of animals not fully de- 

 veloped. But he thinks it probable that most of the individuals he 

 examined were adults, for they varied but little in their proportions. 

 The specimens were found at Muse (Saone et Loire), and at 

 Millery, in the schists from which petroleum is extracted. At this 

 place a slab was obtained showing remains of seven individuals 

 more or less perfect. These schists are considered by some geo- 

 logists to belong to the upper beds of the Coal-measures, but are 



