166 The American Naturalist. [February 
what anomalous, and as the dorsal spines in no true shark are destitute 
of a smooth inserted base, Mr. Woodward refers the fish provisionally 
to the Chimeroids. The extinct members of the latter order do not 
all possess dorsal spines of the normal type observed in the living 
Chimera, as shown by Dr. von Zittel’s Chimzeropsis; and the possi- 
bility of the problematical spines under discussion pertaining to the 
same group is thus rendered more worthy of consideration. In any 
case the name Ccelorhynchus is obviously inappropriate, as well re- 
marked by Williamson; but it has yet to be determined whether the 
dentition of the same fish has not already become known under some 
other suitable generic title. 
Geological News.—Paleozoic.—R. H. Traquair (Geol. Mag., 
Jan., 1889) compares Homosteus Asmuss, Asterolepis Hugh Miller, 
with Coccosteus Agassiz. The dorsal plates of the two genera cor- 
respond closely, but no undoubted remains of a ventral carapace of 
Homosteus have yet been found. 
J. W. Gregory describes in the January number of the Geological 
Magazine a new species of Protaster from the Upper Silurian of 
Victoria, Australia. 
Turrilepas, Woodward, first described from the Wenlock limestone 
and shale of Dudley (England), has been found by Mr. Arvi in the 
Utica formation of Ottawa, Canada. This cirripede has four rows of 
asymmetrical plates, with more than eight plates in a row. 
Echinocaris whidbornei and Beyrichia devonica are added to De- 
vonian fossils by Prof. T. R. Jones and Dr. H. Woodward. Both are 
Entomostraca. (Geol. Mag., Sept., 1889.) 
Mr. R. Etheridge has sent forth a catalogue of the fossils of the 
British Islands, stratigraphically and zoologically arranged. The first 
volume contains the paleozoic forms. In the preface to his catalogue 
Mr. Etheridge gives some interesting figures. In 1822, only 752 ex- 
tinct species of all classes in the animal and vegetable kingdoms were 
own and described. In 1854, 1,280 genera and 4,000 species were 
catalogued by Prof. J. Morris ; at the close of 1874, 13,300 forms had 
been described, and for the most part figured ; and now the census of 
the British Fossil Fauna and Flora comprises 3,750 genera and 18,000 
species, all recorded in monographs and serial works. The species 
included in this volume, ranging from the Cambrian “to the close of 
the Permian, amount to 6,022, and are included in 1,588 genera. 
