392 



THE GEOLOGIST. 



was predicted a month before by a distinguished French geologist, named 

 Brayard, who, nevertheless, is believed to have perished in the ruins. 



M. Brayard occasionally visited Mendoza, and wrote to > a friend residing at 

 Parana, that, having examined the city in a meteorological and geographical 

 point of view, he had ascertained that it was situated between two extinct 

 volcanos, and in the centre of a double current of electricity, from which he 

 concluded that probably before ten years Mendoza would disappear. 



Many distinguished men perished in this earthquake, among others, Martin 

 Zapata, an orator of note. 



On the Clytia Leachii, a long-tailed decapod oe the chalk for- 

 mation. By Prof. Reuss. Prom the Transactions of the Imperial Academy, 

 Vienna, vol. vi. — In the chalk-formation of Bohemia, next to the Callianassa 

 antiqua, of Otto, which is found in quantities in the sandstones of north-eastern 

 Bohemia, belonging to the upper chalk, the above-named species, Clytia 

 Leachii, is the most numerous of the few crustaceans as yet found therein. 

 This species seems to belong to the chalk beds known by the name of Planer 

 Kalk, which belong to the middle qauder-marls of Geinitz (Terrain Turonien 

 of d'Orbigny). At least, as yet, I have never been able to discover them 

 elsewhere. 



Manteli, in his "Fossils of the South Downs,' 1 1822, p. 221—3, pi. xxix., 

 figs. 1 — 4, pi. xxx, figs. 1 and 2, pi. xxxi., figs. 1 — 4, figures and describes the 

 earliest known specimens of this species, discovered in the white chalk of Lewes 

 and Houghton in West Sussex, and gives it the name of Astacus Leachii. 



Plate xxix, figs. 1 — 4, represent the most distinct specimens, wholly 

 corresponding with the remains discovered in Bohemia : they are claws. Plate 

 xxix, fig. 4, shows the claws of a very large specimen. Plate xxx., fig. 2, and 

 PI. xxxi., fig. 4, show the claw of each side opposite one another. Of the 

 ol her limbs nothing distinct can be learnt from the drawing. 



That fig. 5, of pi. xxix, really belongs to this species is improbable, on account 

 of the crookedness of the claw. 



Plate xxxi., figs. 1 — 4, represent the cephalothorax, which, however, seems 

 to have been very incompletely preserved, and is also very indistinctly drawn, 

 so that one cannot say with certainty whether it really belongs to the Astacus 

 Leachii. PI. xxxi., fig. 3, which shows most distinctly the crossline of the 

 cephalothorax, most probably belongs, I fancy, to Astacus Leachii. 



In fig. 2 of pi. xxxi. we have a line running lengthways, which is not to be 

 seen in the much better preserved specimen of Bohemia ; and it would seem, 

 if the specimen represented really belong to the same species, that the line was 

 accidental, and caused by the pressure to which it may have been subjected. 



In PI. 31, fig. 4, is represented one of the outside feelers, and a very indi- 

 si inct elaw of one of the forefeet. Nothing decided can be learnt from either. 



Plate xxx, fig. 1, represents the very incomplete hinder end of the body, in 

 which can be seen the three penultimate body-rings very much squeezed, 

 and the inner tail-pins of the right side in pairs. Whether these really are 

 derived from the Astacus Leachii, the total insulation of this part andf the 

 discovery of other Astacidcs in the same spot do not allow us to say with 

 certainty. 



Some time after Geinitz again discovered this crustacean in the 

 Planer of Strehlen and Weinbohla, Saxony, and gave a description of a 

 fragment from the former of these places, under the name given it by Manteli, 

 (Characters of the Chalk Rocks of Saxe-Bohemia, p. 39, pi. ix., fig. 1). This 

 fragment consists of a cephalothorax which has been subjected to much lateral 

 pressure, and is incomplete in the front part, and a claw of large dimensions. 



Homer in his work on the fossils of the chalk of Northern Germany (p. 105), 

 gives a shori diagnosis j but without adding anything new or mentioning any 



