522 Reviews — Dr. A. Fritsch's Permian Amphibia of Bohemia. 



This Fauna has been, discovered during the last ten years, 

 and in the preface a detailed account is given of the gradual 

 augmentation of material, which comprises in all some forty-three 

 species of Amphibians, thirty-three Fishes, and eleven Arthropodas, 

 besides a single shell of the genus AntJiracosia. This first part con- 

 sists of ninety-two pages of text, with many woodcut illustrations 

 and twelve quarto plates. The work opens with an interesting 

 geological description of the deposits which have yielded the 

 remains. It describes with the help of excellent sections the 

 structure of the Pilsen basin, giving some useful lists of the plant 

 remains and other fossils, and then at less length describes the Schlan- 

 Rakowitz basin : so that the horizons of the specimens are all accu- 

 rately determined. To this memoir succeeds a systematic list of the 

 species, giving an enumeration of the materials available for descrip- 

 tion. The next section of the work is called a history of the 

 classification of Labyrinthodonts, in which the views of Owen, as 

 stated in his Palaeontology, and of Dawson, are briefly referred to ; 

 but the bulk of the article is a verbatim translation of Prof. Miall's 

 two reports to the British Association upon the Carboniferous 

 Labyrinthodontia ; and in conclusion, the work of Prof. Cope on 

 the American Amphibians, and of Prof. Gaudry on Protriton, is 

 briefly noticed. This preliminary matter occupies the first sixty- 

 seven pages. The remains described in the succeeding pages are all 

 referred to Cope's order Stegocephali, which is co-extensive with the 

 Labyrinthodontia, Ganocephaia, and Microsauria, and defined by the 

 supra-occipital and epiotic bones forming well-developed ossifica- 

 tions, by the temporal fossa being covered by the supra-temporal 

 and post-orbital bones, by the presence of a parietal foramen, and by 

 the lower pelvic elements being well developed. The genera now 

 described are named Branchiosaiirus, Sparodus, Hylonomus, and 

 Dawsonia. 



Branchiosaiirus resembles the Earth-salamanders, and especially 

 the young forms, in possessing gills, and the author remarks that the 

 broad anteriorly rounded head, the short thick body, and the well- 

 developed extremities terminating in digits, together with the rudder- 

 like tail, strongly suggest the larval forms of the living Urodela. 

 Branchiosaiirus salamandroides is known from ten complete speci- 

 mens, and fragments which may have belonged to fifty or sixty 

 other individuals. The skeleton ossifies at an early period in life, 

 and all the bones of the skull, vertebral column, and extremities are 

 already defined in examples sixteen millimetres long. And in a 

 somewhat larger individual even the sclerotic plates, ribs, and pha- 

 langes are distinctly seen. 



The largest specimen of this species is 64 millimetres long. If 

 Dr. Fritsch is right in referring all these remains to one species, 

 they present the remarkable condition of the growth of the limbs 

 remaining stationary while the body increases in size and length. 

 Both the humerus and fore-arm are absolutely longer in the animal, 

 measuring 44 millimetres, than in that which has a length of 64 

 millimetres, while in the hind -limb the bones are of equal length in 

 both specimens. 



