Vol. 70.] MEGANEURA RADSTOCKENSIS. 119 



6. On the Occurrence of a Giant Dragon-Fly in the Eadstock 

 Coal Measures. By Herbert Bolton, M.Sc, F.K.S.E., 

 F.Gr.S., Reader in Palaeontology in the University of Bristol. 

 (Eead February 4th, 1914.) 



[Plates XVIII & XIX.] 



Some two years ago, Dr. E. A. Newell Arber drew my attention to 

 a fragment of an insect-wing, lying upon a mass of shale which 

 he had obtained from the Tyning waste-heap at Eadstock Colliery 

 (Somerset), and afterwards deposited in the Sedgwick Museum at 

 Cambridge. Unfortunately, the precise horizon from which the 

 shale came cannot be determined, because the waste-material from 

 no fewer than five collieries is thrown upon the Tyning waste-heap, 

 or Tyning Batch. 1 



By the courtesy of Dr. Arber and the Sedgwick Museum 

 authorities, I have been granted the loan of the specimen for 

 the purposes of examination and description. 



The fragment consists of the proximal portion only of a wing, 

 and forms, I believe, not more than a third of the complete 

 structure. The wing has also been broken along its length, and a 

 portion of the middle lost. This is apparently caused by the shale 

 splitting irregularly, the shaly surface being more than usually 

 uneven. The anterior and posterior portions of the wing-fragment' 

 still retain their normal position relatively one to the other, a 

 condition unlikely to happen if they had drifted separately to the 

 place where they now are. This also bears out the supposition that 

 the breakage is due to fracture of the shale, and that the missmg 

 middle part of the wing was upon the portion of shale that is 

 broken away. The length of the wing-fragment along the anterior 

 margin is 64 mm. ; the length of the hinder margin is but 53 mm., 

 a portion of the proximal extremity being missing. The greatest 

 breadth of the wing is 40 mm. These measurements are indicative 

 of an unusually large wing, and if, as I suppose, but a third of 

 the whole is present, then the span of wing of the complete insect 

 must have been considerable. No insect-wing of so large a size 

 has hitherto been recorded from this country, and it can only be 

 paralleled by wings obtained from the Coal Measures of Commentry 

 (Allier). 



No trace of the body or other parts of the insect can be seen. 



The first feature that attracts attention in the wing-fragment, 

 is the presence of four main veins only. This, if it occurred in a 

 complete wing, would be very anomalous, and at once place the 

 insect outside any known group. Six principal veins are generally 

 recognized in the wing of an Orthopteron or Neuropteron, to one 



1 Q. J. G. S. vol. lxvii (1911) p. 322. 

 Q. J. G. S. No. 278. k 



