274 



THE GEOLOGIST. 



of Pte-njgotus from Tealing, in Eorfarsliire, exhibited at last meeting of the 

 Association at Leeds. It consisted of eight large sculptured segments, and it 

 so happens that I have here before me on the table a very small specimen from 

 Cauterland, consisting also of eight segments, and little more altogether than 

 one-third of an inch in length, a minim thus one-sixtieth part the size of its 

 gigantic brother. From this grey layer there are also weU-marked Ichthyodo- 

 rulites, and for a reason which will hereafter appear, i am disposed to attach 

 considerable value to these remains of ancient fishes. Of the vegetable 

 remains from this locality, and which occur in considerable abundance, I can 

 affirm scarce anything with certainty. Though much broken and carbonized, 

 there are what appear to be fragments of coniferous wood, and there is a very 

 common ribbon-like leaf which used to be thought fucoidal. This I have ever 

 been disposed to question, and it so happens that I have met with instances 

 where the leaf terminates in an apparent seed-vessel, very distinct, however, 

 from the Parka decijnens. Besides these seed-vessels, which occur separated 

 from the stem, there is another globular body of a beautiful yellow colour, and 

 which presents in the cross fracture a radiated appearance or structure. Trom 

 this layer also I have pieces of a crinoidal-looking organism, and several things 

 about which it does not even become me to hazard a conjecture. I have now 

 more particularly to notice that these grey beds pass towards the top into a 

 very thin bed, more regularly stratified, and which presents, Avhen laid open by 

 the stroke of the hammer, smooth level surfaces. On the face of these sur- 

 faces fossils occur, but as for the most part they are very small, they are not so 

 readily observed. They are, however, if I may so speak, the most exquisite 

 carvings of the extinct organisms. They are the spines or other bony parts of 

 the dermal covering of fishes, and to me they give to this layer the deepest 

 interest, although as yet 1 have turned out from this locality only detached 

 fragments. I have the fishes to which they belong entire from the locality, to 

 whicli I am now about to refer. 



Second, a spot in the parish of KinneU, near Earnell station, in the county 

 of Torfar. Erom one of the beds in tins locality I have gathered fossils in 

 excellent preservation and of great beauty. It is a thin shale in which they 

 occur, and I believe it to be the equivalent of the uppermost beds in the sec- 

 tion at Cauterland. This locality was unknown to our local geologists, and I 

 camiot describe the feeling with which on one afternoon of the July of the 

 summer time of 1857, I struck out from its stony bed the almost complete pic- 

 ture of a handsome little fish. There it was, with its every spine and its every 

 scale in place, and with what seemed an enamelled head. "^On further search, I 

 find that it occurs of sizes varying from one inch to something more than three 

 inches. It evidently belongs at least to the family of the Acanthodii. There 

 also occurs here another fish, still more laboriously defended and ornamented. 

 It has two dorsal fins or spines of solid bone, a pectoral s])ine, a curious arrange- 

 ment of smaller spines immediately succeeding, what may be caUed fulcral 

 knobs, like thpse in the stui'geon, and of a very elegant*^ pattern, a highly 

 finished scale for the head, another scale along the anterior part of the dorsal 

 crest, and scales of minuter form spread over the rest of the body. The 

 reader will pardon my referring so mmutely to the different parts of the dermal 

 covering of this little denizen of the ancient seas, when I mention that these 

 arc Hie fragmentary parts of tlie fishes which occur in the den of Cauterland, 

 and enabling us so far at least to co-ordinate the beds. 



In the section at Farnell I have also met M'ith an epistoma of the Fterj/gotiis 

 an(jlici!f<, and an almost complete example of a Ffer^/goh's or Eurypterus, I can- 

 not decide Avhich, of about seven inches in length. The Tarka decijnens also 

 occurs, as might be expected ; and there are other minute Crustacean forms. 

 Ihc vegetable remains arc rare, but there ai'e mimerous IchthyodoruUtes ; and. 



