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DR. STANLEY SMITH ON A V LIN A ROTIFOBMIS, [vol. lxxii, 



Martin described the specimen under the name ' Erismatolithus 

 tuhiporites (radiatus 1 ) ', and stated that the coral was built 

 up of ' straight tubes connected by transverse dissepiments or 

 partitions . . . embedded in a calcareous cellular mass.' From 

 his fig. 2 these ' tubes ' can be readily recognized as cherty 

 casts of the intrathecal region of corallites, and the ' transverse 

 dissepiments ' as silicified layers in the extrathecal tissue. 



The confluent character of the septa is mentioned by Martin, 

 and is well shown in the figure. 



John Fleming (1828), in ' A History of British Animals ' 

 p. 529, recorded Martin's species as ' Tubipora radiata? This 

 citation appears to have been overlooked hitherto, and those 

 palaeontologists who refuse to acknowledge Martin's claim to the 

 authorship of the species which he named, on the grounds that 

 his terminology did not conform to the laws of Linnaean nomen- 

 clature, credit the trivial name 'radiata? to Samuel Woodward, 

 'Synoptical Table of British Organic Bemains ' p. 5 (1830). 



John Bhillips's ' Figures & Descriptions of the Palaeozoic Fossils 

 of Cornwall, Devon, & West Somerset' (1841) contained the 

 figure (pi. vii, fig. 15 d) of the coral from the Carboniferous Lime- 

 stone of Flintshire which Phillips believed to be allied to ' Astreea 

 hennahW (see p. 284), but which actually belonged to the same 

 genus as Martin's ' Erismatolithus tuhiporites (radiatus).' The 

 form is common, and very characteristic of the Lower Carboniferous 

 of North Wales. 



Frederick McCoy, in 1849, 'On some New Genera & Species 

 of Palaeozoic Corals & Foraminifera ' Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist, 

 ser. 2, vol. iii, pp. 124-25, and in 1852, 'A Systematic Description 

 of the British Palaeozoic Fossils in the Geological Museum of the 

 University of Cambridge ' p. 110, pi. iii B, figs. 8 & 9, described, 

 under the generic name Sarcimda,® three 'species' of Orion- 

 astrcea, namely, S. tuberosa, S. placenta, and S. phillipsi. The 

 last he rightly identified with the coral from North Wales 

 figured by J. Phillips. Brief notes upon the type-specimens will 

 be found on pp. 299-300. 



H. Milne Edwards & J. Haime, ' Monographic des Polypiers 

 Fossiles ' 1851, pp. 448 & 449 and ; A Monograph of the British 

 Fossil Corals ' 1852, pp. 203-204, pi. xxxvii, fig. 2, merged 

 8. phillipsi and S. placenta, and identified these with Martin's 

 coral, but retained as a separate species S. tuberosa. Now that 

 I have cut the type-specimens, I consider it more desirable to 

 recognize *S'. phillipsi and S. placenta as distinct species, and 

 to merge S. tuberosa 3 with the former. Moreover, on grounds 



1 The name ' radiatus ' has not been retained, for reasons subsequently 

 explained. 



2 J. B. Lamarck, ' Histoire Naturelle des Animaux sans Vertebres ' vol. ii 

 (1816) p. 222 (for two recent forms, one of which he confuses with a Silurian 

 fossil). 



3 H. M. Edwards & J. Haime, 'Polypiers Fossiles des Terrains Paleozoi'ques ' 

 p. 447, include an American species, P. verneuili in the same genus ; but, 

 arguing from the species so named in the British Museum, I do not consider 

 the form congeneric with the British species. 



