yV/y Lifc-llishrii iif Sjii I'ifcf Ui't'if^. lil 



localities are given — near Itlnica. Toni])kins Co., and, near C'ort- 

 landA'ille, Cortland. Co. 



The species is also recorded from the shores of Seneca Lake ; 

 also, there are s])eciniens in the Mnseum of Cornell University 

 labelled from Flint Creek. Ontario Co. 'J'here is, however, 

 reasonable doubt as to the correctness of the label. Only a few 

 localities are known in which this large fossil is found, and, so 

 far as I can learn, none outside, of the State. 



A study of the species, and of the rocks of the Portage about 

 Ithaca, has shown that, slratigraphically, the species is projaably 

 limited to a mass of shales of not over three feet thickness, 

 marked below by a stratum of argillaceous sandstone, — which 

 in some localities is clearly defined and solid, of a foot in thick-, 

 ness, at other points indistinct by I'eason of the greater amount 

 of argillaceous mattev causing a looser and more shaly structure, 

 — and marked near the top by a thin layer, three or four inches 

 in thickness, of argillaceous sandstone. 



The fossil appears most abundantly in fine soft shale, quite 

 devoid of arenaceous matei'ial, just above the lower sandstone 

 layer, and just above the ujiper four-inch layer. It occurs, also, 

 but not so thickly massed, between the two sandstone layers ; 

 but only one specimen has as yet been seen in' the upper sand- 

 stone layer. 



In his Eeport on the Brachiopods of the State (1. c, p. 237), 

 Prof. Hall remarks, that this is the only species of Spirifer 

 from the Portage formation then (March, 1867) known to him, 

 and as far as any record is published, no other Spirifer has been 

 found as yet (1880). 



At first glance this species recalls forms of later rather than 

 earlier times, and the suggestion is strong to associate it with' 

 the Carboniferous species rather than with the Hamilton or 

 earlier forms which precede it. There are many such forms in 

 the upper Devonian, — both in America and Great Britain and 

 Europe, — which point to a relationship between the two ages, 

 quite impossible to reconcile Avith the idea of any great catas- 

 trophe as separating flie two. 



Comparing it with the Hamilton Spirifers, this is a well- 

 marked species, not the only or the first unplicated, smooth 

 species, but the first large one possessing these characters, and 



