﻿THE GENUS BELLINURUS. 237 



Queen's Co., Ireland ; Coalbrook Dale, Shropshire ; Dudley, Staffordshire; near Mansfield, 

 Nottingham ; Kilraaurs, Scotland. 



The generic term Bellinurus was applied by Konig, in 1820, to a peculiar Crustacean 

 from the Coal-measures, figured and named by him Bellinurus bellulus y 1 previous to this 

 Martin 2 gave a figure and short description of this species, which he called EntomolitJius 

 monoculites ? {lunatus), including it with Trilobites under the same generic term of 

 EntomolitJius, a name which would therefore, according to the rules of nomenclature, be 

 inadmissible. Parkinson 3 figures a similar fossil from Ironstone found in the Coal- 

 measures of Dudley, which he includes with the Trilobites, stating at the same time that 

 it appeared to be identical with that described by Martin. The same species is figured 

 and noticed by Dr. Buckland under the name of Limulus trilobitoides^ and afterwards by 

 Prof. Prestwich, in his paper on the Geology of Coalbrook Dale, who adopts the same 

 name, giving a figure of this and other species belonging to the genus, from the Ironstone 

 found in the Coal-measures of Coalbrook Dale. 5 Lastly, General Portlock figures a 

 specimen said to be from Carboniferous shale (most probably, however, Coal-measures), 

 Maghera, Co. Derry, which he doubtfully refers to the same species. 6 



Professor Morris, in his 'Catalogue of British Fossils,' ed. 2, 1854, cites all the above 

 authorities, except Parkinson, referring the same species to Limulus trilobitoides, 

 Buckland. 



In a paper read by Mr. William Hellier Baily, F.L.S., before the Geological Society 

 of Dublin/ a description was given of a specimen (the only one then obtained) from 

 Bilboa Colliery, Queen's County, discovered by Mr. G. H. Kinahan, M.R.I.A., of the 

 Geological Survey of Ireland, in debris derived from the three-foot bed of shale im- 

 mediately over the coal No. in of the section, Castlecomer district. The accompanying 

 fossils in the same bed of shale were a few scattered plant-remains and numerous small 

 bivalve Unio-Yike shells (probably Myacites), and others of a mytiloid form, which may 

 be referred to Myalina. In this paper some remarks were offered on the allied species 

 from Coalbrook Dale, which had been included with it in the genus Limulus, and it was 

 proposed by Mr. Baily, from the characteristic differences they presented and their 

 supposed greater affinity with the Trilobites, to remove all these Coal- measure Crustacea 

 from that genus, and group them in a new one, under the name of Steropis. 



Since then, Mr. Baily, having obtained more complete specimens from Bilboa Colliery, 

 w r as confirmed in his views with regard to the advisability of separating them from 



1 'Icones Fossilium Sectiles,' by 0. Konig, 1820, pi. xviii, fig. 230. 



2 ' Petrificata Derbiensia,' 1809, pi. xlv, fig. 4. 



3 ' Organic Remains,' 1811, vol. iii, p. 274, pi. xvii, fig. 18. 



4 ' Bridgewater Treatise,' 1836, p. 396, vol. i, and vol. ii, p. 77, t. xlvi, fig. 3. 



5 'Trans. Geol. Soc. Lond.,' ser. ii, 1840, vol. v, pi. xli, fig. 8. 



6 ' Report on Geol. of Londonderry and Tyrone,' 1843, p. 316, pi. xxiv, fig. 11. 



7 ' Journ. Geol. Soc. Dublin,' 1858, vol. viii, p. 89. 



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