BRACHIOPODA. 
317 
SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE ON VITULINA. 
(See p]>. 138-141.) 
Since the printing of the pages of this Volume, embracing the spire-bearing 
brachiopods, attention has been directed by Professor H. S. Williams to the 
fact that the presence of calcified brachial supports in Vitulina was noted by 
him in his address before Section E of the American Association for the 
Advancement of Science, in 1892. (See American Geologist, volume x. No. 3, 
page 165. 1892.) The language used in this place is as follows ; 
“ The most striking evidence of the affinity of these several faunas was derived 
from the study of three rather abundant genera of brachiopods; Leptocodia, 
Vitulina and Tropidoleptus, genera which 1 would describe as old-type genera for 
this Devonian period, i. e., preserving the form and general characteristics of 
the lower Silurian Orthidoe, and Strophomenida,, but assuming the later character 
of calcified brachial supports of the Terebratulas and SpiriferidcB. This is the 
case for at least the first two genera, and Tropidoleptus possesses the punctate 
structure characteristic of the Terebratulas.” 
If it was the author’s intention to intimate, in these sentences, that Vitulina 
is possessed of calcified spirals, his meaning has been most successfully veiled, 
and the reader might quite as fairly infer that the genus was regarded as 
bearing a loop. Professor Williams has, however, kindly communicated some 
further details of this structure accompanied by a figure, drawn from memory, 
showing a multispiral cone directed toward the cardinal angle, and an elongate 
loop showing “ what appeared evidence of a saddle and accessory lamella as 
in AthyrisP The cones are actually paucispiral and directed toward the lateral 
slopes of the pedicle-valve, but as to the structure of the loop our specimen has 
furnished no satisfactory evidence. The presence of a highly developed saddle 
and accessory lamellae would be surprising if true, and indeed quite incongru¬ 
ous with our present knowledge of related genera. 
December, 1893. 
