﻿358 DE. A. SMITH "^OODWAED OIv^ FOSSIL FISHES [Allg. 1908, 



20. On some Eossil Pishes discovered hy Prof. Ennes de Souza in 

 the Cketaceotjs Eoemation at Ilheos (State of Bahia), Beazil. 

 By Aethtje Smith Woodwaed, LL.D., F.R.S., F.L.S., Y.P.G.S. 

 (Eead May 20tli, 1908.) 



[Plates XLII & XLIII.] 



The precise extent of the Lower Cretaceous formation on the 

 coast of Bahia (Brazil) still remains undetermined. Last year, 

 Mr. Joseph Mawson gave to the Society an account of the deposits 

 referable to it in the neighbourhood of Bahia itself^; through 

 Dr. Orville A. Derby, Prof. Ennes de Souza, of Eio de Janeiro, has 

 now submitted to me some fossil fish-remains from Ilheos, which 

 prove that it extends at least to that point, 130 miles south of the 

 area previously described. The specimens represent three new 

 species, but two of them are closely related to those from Bahia, 

 and the third appears to belong to a typically Cretaceous form of 

 Clupeoid fish which has not hitherto been found in America. 

 Prof, de Souza has generously presented these fossils to the 

 British Museum (Natural History), where they form an interesting 

 supplement to Mr. Mawson's collection. They are preserved in 

 bituminous shale like that in which most of the fossil fishes occur 

 near Bahia. 



Mawsonia minoe, sp. nov. (PI. XLII, figs. 1-3.) 



A Coelaeanth is represented by the remains of the greater part 

 of a skeleton of a fish about 60 centimetres long, by part of a 

 cranium, and also by a few bones of a smaller head. The ridged 

 ornament on some of the external bones shows that the species 

 belongs to the genus Matusonia, which is only known from Bahia.^ 



The head of the type-specimen is so much crushed, that it is only 

 of interest as showing the characteristic rugose ornament on part 

 of the cranial roof and on one of the gular plates. Some of the 

 tubercular teeth on the inner bones are also seen. The right 

 operculum, exposed from within but partty flaked away at the 

 postero-inferior margin, is characteristically Ccelacanth, and its 

 greatest depth slightly exceeds its greatest width. As well shown 

 by the smaller specimen (PI. XLII, fig. 3), the outer face of this 

 bone is ornamented with coarse radiating ridges, which are partly 

 reticulate near the point of suspension and are finely striated near 

 the posterior and inferior border. As shown by an impression on 

 the same specimen, the angular bone (PL XLII, fig. 2) rises into a 

 rounded coronoid eminence, and its outer face is covered with an 

 ornament of radiating ridges. 



The remains of the trunk and fins are scattered in the type- 



1 Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. Ixiii (1907) pp. 128-31. 



2 Ibid. pp. 134-37 & pis. vii-viii. 



