2/8 PROCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [April 14, 



3rdly, Catopterus Redjieldi, a broader fish than the preceding, 

 and with scales not so long in proportion to their depth. 



These three, and all others found in the same (new red sandstone?) 

 formation, are heterocercal. Sir P. Egerton is of opinion that far 

 too much importance has been attached by some geologists to the 

 circumstance of the vertebral column not being prolonged so far into 

 the upper lobe of the tail in these genera, Ischypterus and Catopte- 

 rus, as it is in true Paleeonisci, when they have insisted upon it as an 

 argument in favour of the red sandstone of Connecticut being less 

 ancient than the palseozoic period. For at Autun, in France, we find 

 the genus Ischypterus accompanying the true Palseonisci with fossil 

 plants specifically the same as those of the old coal. 



It would be rash to attempt to settle the chronological relations of 

 any group of strata by the presence of some one peculiar generic 

 form of fish ; but if we are to reason on the occurrence of Ischypterus 

 in the present state of our knowledge, it must be in favour of identi- 

 fying the red sandstone of Connecticut with the beds which belong 

 to the uppermost members of the old coal of Europe, as at Autun 

 the coal-measures are almost passing upwards into Permian. The 

 Irish Palceoniscus catopterus of Roan (or Rhone) Hill, Tyrone, re- 

 ferred by Captain Portlock to the trias, is a true Paleeoniscus, and 

 not allied generically either to the Ischypterus of Egerton or the 

 Catopterus of Redfield. 



Whether the Coal-Field of the James River be of marine or fresh- 

 water origin. 



I know of no character in any of the fossils of this coal-field which 

 is inconsistent with the hypothesis that all the strata may have been 

 deposited in a lake, estuary or river-delta. The plants are all 

 terrestrial, and the occurrence of erect Calamites and Equiseta at 

 various heights in the series, and at points widely distant, implies, 

 according to my view, that they were not drifted, but grew on the 

 area where we now find them. Hence I infer the constant proximity 

 of land, the drainage of which may have supplied a body of fresh 

 water. Of the genus Posidonomya too little is as yet known to per- 

 mit us to reason on its habits. In regard to the fish (omitting the 

 new genus), I am informed by Sir P. Egerton that Tetragonolepis is 

 accompanied in the British lias by Lepidotus, which last genus 

 abounds in the freshwater strata of the Wealden in England. 



The Coal-Field probably of the age of the Inferior Oolite and Lias, 



It will appear from the subjoined account, drawn up by Mr. 

 Charles J. F. Bunbury, of the fossil plants procured by me from the 

 coal-field, that they belong to fifteen forms, and that they bear upon 

 the whole a very decided analogy to the oolitic and triassic Flora of 

 Europe. The Calamites arenaceus, one of the most abundant plants, 

 has as yet been traced up no higher than the trias in Europe*. 



* Mr, Prestwicli has mentioned the plant as occurring in the old coal of Coal- 

 brookdale (Geol. Trans. 2nd series, vol. v. p. 488), but Mr. Morris informs me, 

 after inspecting the specimens, that this was a mistake for Calamites Suckowii. 



