﻿102 CARBONIFEROUS AND PERMIAN FORAMINIFERA. 



Genus — Nodosinella, gen. nov. 



Dentalina (in part), Dawson, Brady. 



General characters. — Test free ; straight, arcuate, or crooked, never spiral ; formed 

 either of a tube constricted at intervals, or of a single series of segments variously com- 

 bined. Test imperforate, texture finely arenaceous, though sometimes smooth externally. 

 Aperture variable, simple or compound. 



The uniserial Foraminifera which have been brought together to constitute the genus 

 Nodosinella are a somewhat anomalous set of forms, and their association in one group 

 has been adopted because it seemed open to fewer objections than any other course that 

 could be suggested. 



The Carboniferous uniserial species, as far as can be made out, are all imperforate ; 

 their texture is subarenaceous, and their septation rudimentary. These characters, 

 if confirmed, are sufficient to separate them at once from the true Nodosarince. The 

 only other genus to which they could be supposed to belong is that termed by Prof. 

 Reuss Haplostiche, the characters of which as laid down by its author might with 

 a little modification be taken to include most of the Carboniferous specimens. But 

 Prof. Reuss appears to accept the Beophax scorpiurus of de Montfort as the type of his 

 genus, thereby indicating a set of Foraminifera essentially different in shell-structure from 

 those now under consideration. De Montfort's species is a characteristically rough 

 organism, with a test built up of coarse siliceous sand-grains, fitted together with but 

 little calcareous cement. It is quite true that all Prof. Reuss's figures do not conform to 

 this typical character, and that they show considerable range of modification, some being 

 more, some less rough externally, and the texture of others is indeterminable from the 

 drawings ; but as in any case the name Beophax takes precedence of Haplostiche, whatever 

 the zoological value assigned to either term, it is not needful to criticise the nomenclature 

 of the Tertiary forms described under the latter appellation. That it maybe found conve- 

 nient to reintroduce de Montfort's name for the rough, sandy, Nodosariform Lituolce is 

 possible ; but the Carboniferous specimens have little in common with these, and it there- 

 fore becomes necessary to establish a genus for their reception. 



Notwithstanding some range of variation in shell-structure, the relation of the new 

 type Nodosinella to the genus Beophax (or Haplostiche) is almost precisely analogous to 

 that which subsists between Trochammina and Lituola (proper) or Haplophragm.ium, the 

 one characterised by a nearly smooth arenaceous shell, in which the calcareous cement is 

 largely in excess of the constituent sand-grains, the other by a coarse test, externally 

 rough, with the angular siliceous grains held together by the minimum of calcareous 



