AVilliston.] The Upper Cretaceous. 29 



ing if he would be kind enough to examine the fossils and tell 

 him what they were. 



Mrs, Mudge has kindly placed in my hands a part of the cor- 

 respondence that followed, and I give herewith a letter from 

 Professor Cope, after he had received the first consignment of 

 fossils. 



It will be observed that Professor Cope speaks of a specimen 

 found near the vicinity of Sheridan, now McAllaster. This 

 specimen, with others, was, I believe, taken later in the season, 

 while on a brief trip for the purpose of examining the geology 

 in the vicinity of Wallace. He had no team or outfit, but col- 

 lected the specimens from the immediate vicinity of the station. 



Philadelphia, October 28, 1870. 

 Prof. B. F. Mudge: Esteemed Friend — The fossils arrived in safety, thanks 

 to the careful packing, and I have examined and determined most of them. The 

 collection is a valuable one, and is an earnest of what can be done for the geolog- 

 ical survey of Kansas under more favorable opportunities for collection. 



I found portions of six species of reptilia, all of the order Pythonomorpha , 

 and five species of fishes, of the new family of Saurodontidce. Of the reptiles, 

 there were two distorted vertebrae of a large Elasmosaurus, the species not de- 

 terminable ; one vertebra of a large Liodon, probably L. proriger Cope. The 

 limb bones and accompanying vertebrse belong to a Polycotylus (Cope), but 

 whether to P. latipennis is not yet determined. The three other reptiles are 

 quite determinable, and new to science. I have called them Liodon mudge?, 

 after the state geologist of Kansas, Liodon ictericus (two individuals sent), and 

 Glidastea cinen'arum — the last from the gray clay limestone near Sheridan. 



The fishes are quite interesting, and have enabled me to define a new family, 

 and correct the work of Agassiz and Leidy. They belong to the genus Sauro- 

 eephalus of Harlan, which has been heretofore regarded as a Sphyroznoid fish. 

 I find that it has not the least relationship to that order, but forms a new and 

 interesting group near the Ganoids and Characius. In order to determine it 

 more fully, I am exceedingly desirous of getting more complete remains, especially 

 of the cranium and fins. The following is a list of the species : 



Saurocephalus phlebotomus Cope, n. sp. 



<S'. prognathus Cope, sp. nov. 



»S'. napahaticus Cope, sp. nov. 



>S'. ihaumas Cope, sp. nov. 

 This last is the large fish eight feet long without head from 100 miles up the 

 Solomon. Its remains were highly interesting and enabled me to determine 

 many new points in the structure of the group. I found by means of it that the 

 group has a vertebrated tail ; also that its anal or caudal fin-ray is that which has 

 always been referred to the Pfychodon genus of sharks by Professor Agassiz. 

 The pectoral rays have just been described by Leidy as a new genus of catfish, 

 Xiphaetinus audax! Then there is a new genus of the same family, Ichthyo- 



