Page:Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, vol. 34.djvu/31

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R. ETHERIDGE, JUN., ON LOWER-CARBONIFEROUS INVERTEBRATA.
7

History' in August last year[1] a shell was described as Leptodomus? clavatus, which is common at four localities—Woodhall, Granton, Drumsheugh, and Craigleith. Some further remarks are made upon this species further on. The base of the Cement-stone group at the Clubbidean Reservoir in the Pentland Hills appears to be well marked by the presence of a limestone in which a bivalve occurs referred by Mr. Salter to the genus Myalina. I have never seen good specimens of this form. A thin papyraceous little shell is very characteristic of the Wardie Shales at Slateford, of which numerous specimens are in the Survey Collection. By Mr. Salter it was regarded as an Anthracomya[2]; I have labelled it Anthracoptera papyracea, R, Eth. (MS.). In the 'Geological Magazine' for June last (1877) I described another bivalve, equally characteristic of the beds in connexion with the Burdiehouse Limestone, as Anthracomya scotica[3].

Gasteropoda.—No members of this class had been described from our Lower Carboniferous rocks, so far as I am aware, until I noticed the occurrence of a variety of Bellerophon decussatus, Flem., at Woodhall, Water of Leith[4].

Cephalopoda.—Mr. Salter recorded two species of Orthoceras from Livingston, near Mid Calder. I am not aware that any other specimens have been found in that immediate locality.

II. Descriptions of the Species from the Wardie-Shale section of the Cement-stone group contained in the Cabinets of Mr. John Henderson and Mr. Gall, Edinburgh.

With the exception of a few of the specimens, the species described in the following pages are in the cabinet of Mr. J. Henderson, who has collected extensively from the Wardie Shales, and has been kind enough to place his collections at my disposal for description. I am also indebted to Mr. Gall, through Mr. Henderson, for the loan of several additional specimens from the same beds. I must not omit to mention that Mr. James Bennie has made an extensive collection, not only from the Wardie-Shale division, but also from the other horizons of the Lower Carboniferous. In working out Mr. Henderson's fossils the examination of the Survey Collection has been of great assistance to me; and could I have combined the description of the latter with the present notes, the number of species from the Lower Carboniferous generally would be greatly increased, and the conclusions arrived at of a more extended and complete character.

I have experienced considerable difficulty in the discrimination of some of the species, not only from the usually bad state of preservation in which the specimens are found, but also from the want of works bearing on similar deposits and their contents elsewhere.

  1. "Notes on Carboniferous Lamellibranchiata," vol. xviii. 4th series, p. 101.
  2. Memoir 32, p. 146.
  3. Dec. 2, iv. p. 244, t. 12. fig. 8.
  4. Geol. Mag. Dec. 2, iii. p. 244.