318 



THE GEOLOGIST. 



Catalogues of Fossils. — Sm, — I should esteem it a favour if you could 

 give me some plau to assist me in making a catalogue of my little collec- 

 tion of fossils. I enclose a specimen leaf of the book I have had made for it, 

 with my idea of the way to do it, and shall be extremely obliged for your 

 opinion, and also for any information you can give me as to where I could find 

 information about those fossils of which I may perhaps have only the names, and 

 whether such a thing is to be had as a catalogue of fossils of the different 

 formations classified. 



Deposit. 



No. 1 Name. 





1 



2 lElUpsoceplialus Hoffii. 



Kingdom. 



Invertebrata. Crustacea. 



Class. 



Family. 



Locality. 

 Bohemia, 



M. 



— Yours truly, A. 



It is not usually found advisable to be continually stating the kingdom and 

 class of animals fossihzed, as the student soon becomes acquainted with these 

 great features. A general table of the classification of animals and plants 

 should be kept at hand for reference until the mind is acquainted with the 

 chief points. We should advise a more condensed method, such as the 

 following : — 



No. 



Genus, 



ELipsocephalus. 



Species. 



Stratum. 



Hoffii. Limestone. 



Rock Series. 



Upper Silurian. 



Locality. 



Bohemia. 



Catalogue-making for a collection is not an easy task to begin with, and as 

 specimens are always accumulating, the catalogue is constantly requiring 

 alteration. We are not, therefore, prepared to propose any definite plan, but 

 we williugly give our correspondent and our readers some hints which we thiuk 

 may be useful to them. In the first place they must decide upon what principle 

 they will base their catalogue. It must be either upon the stratigraphical suc- 

 cession of the geological formatiotis or on a natural history basis ; we must 

 arrange our fossils in stratal groups, each group beiag the contents of a certain 

 bed or formation, or we must arrange our fossils according to their structure, 

 value, and position in the animal or vegetable kingdoms. In other words, we 

 must sort them into geological or palseontological order. Eor our part we 

 thiiik local collectors wiU do most wisely in. arranging their fossils with the 

 most minute accuracy and precision in sets representing each individual stratum 

 of the formations which are developed in their neighbourhoods. This method 

 will give a real value to the collection, howeier small, and will also induce the 

 collector to observe minutely the zones of organized forms as they occur in the 

 rock-masses. In the arrangement of these distinct stratigraphical groups the 

 natural history order may be subordinately adopted, and we shaU thus get the 

 advantage of seeing at a glance the relative number of species of each animal 

 or vegetable family or order of which any remains exist in the bed. We thmk 

 also it would be very desirable to head the chief divisions of the catalogue with 

 one or more accurate sections of the formations from which the fossils are 

 obtained, and to number and name the strata of which the groups of fossils 

 re)ir(^scut the organic contents. 



The j^-reatest difficulty in cataloguing arises from the CvOnstant accumulation 

 of specimens, and the only way to surmount this obstacle, perhaps, is to give a 

 delinitc number to the species, and a second or subsidiary number to the speci- 

 men, thus : — 



CatJiloguo. Specimen. 

 No. No. 



Plagiostoma spinosa, Chalk, (Dover). 



(or Spondylus spinosus.) 

 , Chalk, (Lewes). 



