REPORT OF THE STATE PALEONTOLOGIST 1901 Oil 



Blideslieim. Dames vehemently contended that none of these 

 bodies was crustacean, that all their characters pointed to 

 their function as operculums of goniatites, so far as goniatites 

 existed at this time, and, as for the rest, their nature was 

 unknown. Woodward, subsequently reviewing all the evidence, 

 admitted that some of the bodies were of goniatite nature, but 

 concluded from analogy with such shields as Peltocaris (lower 

 Siluric), in which the triangular cleft was indubitably covered 

 with a rostral plate, that the others were rationally ascribable 

 to the Crustacea. 



The latest observations on these bodies are those of Holz- 

 apfel supplementary to his description of the Goniatites 

 of the Domanik scMefer. It was from these shales that de 

 Verneuil described the first known of these bodies as aptychus 

 of a goniatite. Holzapfel, in rehearsing all the evidence in 

 more detail than is given in the foregoing and without attempt- 

 ing to enter upon an analysis of possible crustacean structure, 

 concludes that at any rate Spathiocaris and Cardiocaris 

 were not aptychi or ammonoid operculums. That they may 

 not have had some other function in the ammonoid body, 

 he is not disposed to deny. From so high an authority on the 

 structure of the goniatites this opinion carries much weight; 

 and Holzapfel reiterates the statement by de Yerneuil that 

 these bodies occurring in the black layers of the Domanik 

 schiefer are not immediately associated with goniatite shells. 



The writer has repeatedly drawn attention to the same 

 feature of the occurrence of these bodies in the Naples and 

 Genesee beds of New York, where, after 25 years of search and 

 the acquisition of hundreds of spathiocarids, in no instance 

 has any specimen been observed in association close enough 

 to suggest, of itself, any relation to the ammonoids. We are 

 now speaking of the singly cleft shields, such as have been in 

 two recorded instances found within the goniatite chambers in 

 the limestones of Germany, as above referred to. 



Here is evidence of affinity which points both ways. To prove 

 these bodies opercular shields or covers for any other parts of 



