408 THE WONDERS OF GEOLOGY. Lect. IV. 



are, for the most part, either of the shark family, or of 

 related genera ; and of species allied to the large river-pikes 

 of South America. Detached scales, teeth, dorsal rays, and 

 bones of these fishes are very abundant ; but it is rarely 

 that united portions, either of the skeleton, or of the dermal 

 covering, are preserved. 



Strong thick enamelled scales, bearing a high polish and 

 having two processes of attachment, with small hemi- 

 spherical teeth, called by the workmen fishes' eyes, are the 



Lign. 99. — Restored outline of the Lepidotus of the Wealden. 

 (By M. Agassiz.) 



most common relics of this kind.* They belong to the 

 Lepidotus, or bony pike, a genus of which a living repre- 

 sentative inhabits the rivers of South America. In the 

 grits and conglomerates of Tilgate Forest, and of Hastings, 

 these scales and teeth are in prodigious numbers. A few 

 tolerably perfect specimens of the fishes from which these 

 teeth and scales were derived have been obtained, and have 

 enabled M. Agassiz to determine the form of the original 

 (Lign, 99). f In the Purbeck strata a small species of 

 Lepidotus is equally abundant. 



* Medals of Creation, vol. ii. p. 637. 



t A specimen in the British Museum (from my collection) has a 

 considerable part of the cranium and body, with the dorsal and pectoral 

 fins. Another (discovered by Robert Trotter, Esq. formerly of Borde Hill, 

 Sussex) retains a mass of the scales in juxtaposition, more than a foot 

 wide, near where the caudal fin commences; this fish must therefore 

 have been ten or twelve feet long, and three feet wide. 



