THE 



GEOLOGICAL MAGAZINE. 



NEW SERIES. DECADE II. VOL. III. 



No. X.— OCTOBER, 1876. 



CDJRXC3rXl<TJ^Xj .iLI^TIOI^.:BS. 



I. — Contributions to our Knowledge of the Fish-fauna of the 

 Tertiary Deposits of the Highlands of Padang, Sumatra. 



By Dr. Albert Gunther, V.P.E.S., 

 Keeper of the Zoological Department, British Museum. 



(PLATES XV.— XIX.) 



THE Geological Magazine for October, 1875 (pp. 477-486), 

 contains an article "On the Geology of Central Sumatra," by 

 Herr E. D. M. Yerbeek, Superintendent of the Geological Survey of 

 that island, in which the position of the fossiliferous rocks of the 

 Highlands of Padang is sketched in a manner as clear as concise, and 

 which must be consulted by those who desire to understand the 

 palseontological age of the fossils described in this paper. 



The specimens were collected by Herr Verbeek, and transmitted 

 to Prof. T. Kupert Jones, F.E.S., by whom they were placed in my 

 hands for examination and comparison with the materials in Europe. 

 All are from Tertiary deposits ; and more especially from the Marl- 

 slates, marked 5 a in Herr Verbeek's diagrammatic section, and from 

 the Carbonaceous shale of 5 h. Those from the latter deposit are in a 

 most fragmentary state — only teeth, spines, and some of the harder 

 bones being preserved ; and it would appear that the Fishes did not 

 live actually at the locality where this deposit was formed (may be, 

 out of the low vegetation of a bog), but that fragments of them 

 were carried there by some agency. The fossils from the Marl- 

 slates, on the other hand, are in a very good state of preservation, 

 most of the bones being in their natural position and connexion, 

 and even tender parts, such as the fin-rays, being still perfect. 

 The incomplete condition of a part of the specimens is due rather to 

 accidents during or after their removal from the deposit, and to the 

 ready exfoliation to which the matrix is subject. 



With regard to their systematic position, these Sumatran fossils 

 stand in the same relation to the recent Fish-fauna of the island, as 

 those of the Brown Coal of Bonn to their successors in recent times. 

 The majority are generically identical with the living forms occurring 

 in the island at the present time ; some may be referred to genera 

 hitherto not found in Sumatra, but still persistent in remote parts 

 of the globe ; whilst others belong to genera not recognizable in 

 our recent fauna. However, we have to remember that the recent 

 Fish-fauna of Sumatra is but imperfectly and partially known ; and 



DECADE II. — VOL. III. — NO. X. 28 



