162 GANOID FISHES OF THE CARBONIFEROUS FORMATION 



Genus — Myriolepis, Egerton, 18G4. 



Generic Character*. — Fusiform; suspensorium obliqne; g<ipe wide; teeth conical; 

 dorsal fin placed nearly opposite the interval between the ventrals and the anal ; caudal 

 completely heterocercal, ineqnilobate ; scales minute, rhombic and striated; fulcra, 

 when visible, very minute. 



This genus was founded by Sir Philip Grey Egerton 1 on two specimens from the 

 Kemper of Xew South Wales — one without fins, while the other was represented 

 by a photograph, showing the head of the fish with the pectoral, ventral, and 

 dorsal fins, the anal and caudal being wanting. The affinities of the fish, which was, 

 moreover, remarkable for the minuteness of its scales, were supposed to he with Aero- 

 lepis, which according to modern ideas implied that they were Palaeoniscid. 



Twenty-six years afterwards 2 Dr. A. Smith Woodward published descriptions and 

 figures of the same species from the same locality and horizon, as well as of a second 

 species (M. latun), which clearly showed that, except in the sniallness of the scales, the 

 genus was typically Palaeoniscid, with the fins shaped and placed much as in Elonichthyg 

 and Acrolepis. The condition of the rays of the pectoral fin, as regards transverse 

 articulation, remains, however, still doubtful in the type species of the genus. 



In 1893 I published a description of a new Palaeoniscid fish from the Coal 

 .Measures of Co. Kilkenny, Ireland, contained in the Museum of the Owens College, 

 Manchester, which I referred to this genus under the name of Myrioleph Hibernicus 

 on account of the sniallness of the scales and other resemblances which it bore to the 

 Australian M. Ciarkei, and with it I also identified another specimen from the same 

 locality in the Geological .Museum in Jermvn Street. London. In both of these 

 specimens the tail is wanting, but that deficiency in the Carboniferous species has now 

 been remedied by specimens figured by II. Bolton and by Smith Woodward, to which 

 reference will be made in their proper places. 



1. Mtriolepis Hibernica, Traquair. Plate XXXVI, fig. 3; Plate XXXVII, figs. 



Mtriolepis hibebnicus, Traquair. Geol. Mag. [3],vol.x, 1893, pp. 51 — 56, pi. iii. 



— Herbert Bolton. Trans. Geol. Soc. Manchester, vol. ixii, 



1894, pp. 1 — i. pis. i, ii. 



— A. S. Woodward. Ann. and Mug. Xat. Hist. [7], vol. xviii, 



pp. 416—419, pi. x. 



1 " On .Some Icbthyolites from New South Wales," in ' Quart. Journ. Geol. SoC.,' vol. is, 18U4, 

 pp. 1—5, pi. i. 



2 "Fossil Fishes of the Hawkesburv Series at Grosford, jST. S. Wales," 'Mem. Geol. Surv. N.S. 

 Wales' No. i (Sydney, 1890), pp. 7—11, pi. ii, figs. 3, 4, pi. iii, figs. 1—3. 



