DESCRIPTION 



OF 



THE BRITISH FOSSIL CORALS. 



CHAPTER I. 

 CORALS OF THE CRAG. 



The Crag formation of the East of England is generally reputed very rich in Fossil 

 Corals ; and the name given to the lower strata of this system is even derived from the 

 abundance of various organic remains of coralloid appearance which occur in some 

 localities. But this opinion arises from the confusion which has till lately been made 

 between Bryozoa and Polypi ; in reality true Corals are far from being common in any of 

 these beds. The four species mentioned by Mr. Searles Wood, in the Catalogue of the 

 Zoophytes of the Crag, published in 1844 in the ' Annals of Natural History,' are the only 

 known Polypidoms belonging to this geological division. 



These fossils are found in the Red Crag as well as in the Coralline Crag, and most of 

 them are as yet peculiar to England ; only one species has been met with on the Continent, 

 in the Crag of Antwerp, a strata belonging to the same geological horizon ; and none of 

 them are known to live in the seas of the present period. The Sphenotrochus intermedins 

 has, it is true, been considered as existing on the coast of England as well as in the Crag ; 

 but the recent species, which has lately received the name of Sphenotrochus Andrewianus, 1 

 is perfectly distinct from the fossil Coral to which it was at first referred. It is also worthy 

 of remark that the Crag Corals belong to four distinct genera, each of which is represented 

 by different species in the other Miocene formations j that three of these genera are also 

 represented by peculiar species in our actual Fauna, and that none of them have been 

 discovered in strata anterior to the older tertiary formations. 



1 Milne Edwards and J. Haime, Monographic des Turbinolides, Ann. des Sc. Nat., 3 me serie, vol. ix, 

 p. 245, tab. vii, fig. 4. 



