646 



TRIL0B1TES. 



adopt that of Palceades (from iraXaioc,, old, ancient), or to substitute certain generic 

 names for others previously in use, even though proposed by so eminent an author 

 as Dalman 1 . What does science gain by changing the Paradoxides of Brongniart, first 

 called Entomolithus paradoxus by Linnaeus, for Olenus, the name of a son of Vulcan, 

 who, together with his beautiful wife Lethaea, was converted into stone ? What advan- 

 tage has Battus over Agnostus ? Such terms, derived from the Heathen Mythology, 

 would doubtless have been well received, if M. Dalman had applied them before these 

 forms had received other names ; but are inadmissible when, though not conveying 

 new views in natural history, they are put forth to supplant a nomenclature already 

 established. New generic names are only to be adopted, when forms entirely new are 

 discovered. 



As, however, our own country abounds with many well-preserved trilobites, so among 

 them some have been found which really require to be generically distinguished ; such, 

 for example, are the Homalonotus (Konig), the Acidaspis and Bumastus (nobis), and the 

 Trinucleus (Lhwyd) 2 . 



Of the place which these animals occupied in the animal kingdom, I will now merely 

 state that naturalists are agreed in considering them to be marine crustaceans, and 

 that Dr. Buckland, combining in his recent Bridgewater Treatise the observations of 

 Audouin, Brongniart, Leach, and other modern authors, has given his view of their 



1 The original work of Dalman is published in the Swedish language, (Trans, of the Stockholm Academy), 

 but it has been translated into German by Engelhart, "Ueber die Palseaden oder die so genannten Trilobiten." 

 Although for the reasons assigned, I have adhered to the terminology of Brongniart, I ought at the same time 

 to state, that the monograph of the Swedish author is one of high merit. In it we find a list of thirty-eight 

 writers upon trilobites, including Linnaeus, Lhwyd, Wilckens, Wahlenberg, Knorr, Da Costa, Lehmann, Blu- 

 menbach, Schlottheim, Sternberg, Keilhau, Parkinson, Stokes, Guettard, Audouin, Brongniart, Latreille, Dekay, 

 Leonhardt, Bronn, &c. To this long list we may add the name of Goldfuss, who has illustrated the views of 

 Audouin, and imagined that he discovered vestiges of articulated feet attached to the under surface of tri- 

 lobites. 



From the work of Eichwald " De Trilobitis Observations, " Casan, 1825, we learn that in the Russian pro- 

 vinces adjoining the Baltic, there is a succession of marly, compact, and crystalline limestones, underlaid by 

 sandstone and shale. Subsequent examination will, I have little doubt, enable us to place the trilobitic rocks 

 of Sweden and Norway as described by Hisinger, Dalman and Keilhau, as well as those of Russia above alluded 

 to, in parallel with our Upper and Lower Silurian Rocks of Britain, although the mineral characters may vary, 

 as indeed they do in our country, when the strata, of the same age, are followed to considerable distances. 



Kloden has collected many trilobites in the gravel of Brandenburg, including our well-known species, Calymene 

 Blumenbachii, C. macrophthalma, Asaphus caudatus, and others of our genus Trinucleus of the Lower Silurian 

 Rocks, all of which have apparently been drifted from Scandinavia. " Versteinerungen der Mark Brandenburg, 

 1834," a work full of close research. 



In alluding to the literature of this branch of natural history, I must lastly mention an interesting German 

 memoir by Dr. Quenstedt in Wiegmann's Archiv, Part iv. 1837., in which the author attempts to establish a 

 new classification of trilobites by their structure. A translation of this sketch is about to appear in the highly 

 useful new English periodical, the Annals of Natural History. 



3 Trinucleus is the old name of Lhwyd or Lloyd (spelt Llhwydd p. 217 ante), see p. 659. 



