104 



ORGANIC REMAINS. 



ledons of doubtful affinity, JEquisetacecc, Filices, LycopodiacecB, &c, the greater part of which are 

 figured in the British Fossil Flora by Messrs. Lindley and Hutton, others by the foreign fossil bo- 

 tanists, Sternberg, Adolphe Brongniart, &c. Of these the Stigmaria Jicoides, Neuropteris cor data, 

 Odontopteris obtusa, Pecopteris lonchitica (see wood-cut), Lepidostrobus variabilis, and Sigillaria 

 Murchisonii are common to this and other coal-fields in Shropshire 1 . 

 The animal remains consist of 



Fishes, three genera, viz. Gy r acanthus formosus, Megalichthys Hibherti, and Hybodusl, of 

 Agassiz. 



Crustacea, Cypris; Limulus trilobitoides (Buckland). Trilobites; three small species, un- 

 described, and dissimilar to any individuals of this family, which we shall afterwards point out"- 

 in such great abundance in the rocks of the Silurian System. 



Conchifera and Mollusca. Upwards of forty species, among which are two beautiful spe- 

 cies of Orbicula, Productus scabriculus (M. C. t. 69. fig. 1.) ; Unio, two or three species j Spirifer, 

 three species; Nautilus, four species; Ammonites (Goniatites)), two species; Bellerophon, two 

 species; Cirrus, two species ; Orthoceras, one species, &c. Most of these organic remains have 

 been already figured in Phillips's Geology of Yorkshire, vol. ii., or in Sowerby's Mineral Conchology, 

 as species belonging to the Carboniferous or mountain limestone. 



The published and unpublished species all differ from the fossils hereafter to be described 

 in the Silurian System. In addition to these fossils, Insects have also been found in 

 ironstone concretions, the specimens of which are in the cabinet of Mr. W. Anstice. 

 These are noticed by Mr. Prestwich, and two figures of them have subsequently been 

 published by Dr. Buckland in his Bridgewater Treatise as Curculionidts, most resembling 

 (according to Curtis and Samouelle) African and South American types. Dr. Buckland 

 has with great propriety named one of these Curculionides Ansticii, the other C. Prest- 

 vicii, vol. ii. p. 76. The wing of the insect represented in the wood-cut on the next 

 page has been furnished by my friend Dr. Mantell, in whose rich museum at Brighton 

 it may now be seen. It was previously supposed to be a plant, and was sent to 

 M. Adolphe Brongniart, who immediately perceived that the transverse nervures were 

 unlike anything in the vegetable kingdom, and on being referred to M. Audouin it was 

 pronounced to be the wing of a neuropterous insect closely resembling the living Cory- 

 dalis of Carolina and Pennsylvania, 



This copious list of fossils enables us to speculate with some security on the probable 

 conditions under which the various strata of this coal-field were accumulated. Here 

 we find the forms of many terrestrial plants, and even of insects, entombed amid a 

 variety of shells and some crustaceans, the greater part marine, but others, such as the 

 Uniones and Cypris, unquestionably of a nuviatile origin. The precise relations of the 

 alternating beds containing these various remains are well explained by Mr. Prestwich. 



1 Dr. Du Gard has collected many beautiful fossil plants from this coal-field, particularly large stems, many 

 of which, together with specimens derived from Mr. Anstice's collection, now form part of the museum of the 

 Natural History Society of Shropshire and North Wales, recently established at Shrewsbury. _ ■' , 



