Lower-Carboniferous Entomostraca. By T. Tl. Jones. 319 



end is indicated as the anterior "by its relation to wliat appears to 

 be the projection of the front hinge-joint, as usual in many Cyth- 

 erids and Cyprids. 



Not agreeing, then, with any known genus, this little Ostracod 

 from Brunton, Northumberland, requires a nominal group to bo 

 determined for it ; and, known only as occuring in the BerDician*' 

 system, it may be termed Bcrnix. 



Its habitat was either lacustrine or estuarine, for the specimens 

 are found in a carbonaceous and pyritous shale, that is, a mud 

 charged with vegetable and other organic matter, sulphur, and 

 iron. 



Bernix Tatei occurs in a pyritized state and liable to decomposi- 

 tion, in crowded groups, with AntJiracosia, Lingula, and fish remains, 

 in a dark carbonaceous shalef below the " Big Limestone, " in the 

 the middle of the Mountain-Limestone series of Northumberland, 

 at Brunton, near Chollerford, on the North Tyne. It was 

 collected by Mr G-. Tate during a tour along the Eoman Wall in 

 1857. See G. Tate's " Geology of the District traversed by the 

 Eoman Wall, 4to, 1867, p. 7. 



A similar fossil, evidently a slightly modified variety of the 

 same species, having a radiately ornamented surface, but with 

 a rather less oblong contour, has been discovered by Prof. 

 Lebour, F.G.S., in a hard black carbonaceous shale, con- 

 taining Anthracomya (?), and belonging to the Upper-Bernician 

 (Yoredale) group of West Northumberland. The carapaces are 

 thickly strewn, both in patches and scattered, on the bed-planes, 

 together with numerous small shiny Cytherce (?), sharp at one 

 end and blunt at the other, somewhat like C.pungens, J. &. K. and 

 moreover like Darwlnella in outline, as intimated by Dr G. S. 

 Brady, F.E.S., in a letter to Prof. Lebour. 



Prof. Lebour informs me that his specimens of Bernix Tatei 

 come from a " Shale, containing fish-remains and plants, a few 

 feet below the Great Limestone (the best known bed of the 

 Upper-Bernician series), where it crosses the Eiver North Tyne 



* Those limestones, shales, coals, sandstones, and grits of the North- 

 umberland District (about 10,000 feet thick) which are equivalent to the 

 Yoredale and Mountain-limestone series of the south. See G. A. Lebour's 

 " Outlines of the Geology of Northumberland," small 8vo. 1878 ; Lambert, 

 Newcastle on Tyne. 



t Constituting a black-band ironstone ; see Mr G. Tate's description in 

 the " Proceed. Berwicksh. Nat. Club, " vol. v., p. 88, 



