274 
THE GEOLOGIST. 
of PIcn/f/oliis {rom Tciiliuc;', in li'orfarsliirc, oxliiljited at last niccliug of llie 
Asbooiatioii at Leeds. It consisted of eight large sculptured segments, and it 
so l)ap]icns that I have here before nic on the table a very small specimen from 
Cuuterlaud, 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 
gigani ic brother. From this grey layer there arc also well-marked Iclithyodo- 
rulites, and for a reason which will hereafter ap])ear, i am disposed to attach 
considerable value to these remains of ancient fislics. Of the vegetable 
romauis from this locality, and which occur in considerable abundance, 1 can 
affirm scarce anything with certauity. Though much broken and carbonized, 
there are what apjiear to be fragments of coniferous wood, and there is a very 
common ribbon-likc leaf which used to be thought fucoidal. This I have ever 
been disposed to question, and it so happens that I have met with histanccs 
where the leaf terminates in an apparent seed-vessel, very distinct, however, 
from the Parka dec'qiiens. Besides these seed-vessels, which oecvir 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. From 
this layer also I have pieces of a criuoidal-looking organism, and several tilings 
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, when 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 entke from the locality, to 
which I am now about to refer. 
Second, a spot in the parish of KinneU, near Farnell station, in the county 
of Forfar. From one of the beds in this locality I have gathered fossils in 
excellent preservation and of great beauty. It is a thin shale in which they 
occur, and I beheve 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 
cannot 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 spine, a curious arrange- 
ment of smaller spines immediately succeeding, what may be called fuleral 
knolis, like those in the sturgeon, and of a very elegant jjatteni, 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 wUl pardon my referring so minutely to the different parts of the dermal 
covering of this little denizen of the ancient seas, when I mention that these 
are the fragmentary parts of the 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 with an epistoma of the Pterygotvs 
anglicus, and an almost corriplcte example of a Pterygotm or Eiiri/jiterus, I car.- 
uot decide which, of about seven inches in length. The Parka decipiens also 
occurs, as might be expected ; and there are other minute Crustacean forms. 
The vegetable remains arc rare, but there are numerous Ichthyodorulites ; and. 
