Notice of a Batrachoid Fossil in British Coal-shale

Abstract

Whilst in the museum of the Earl of Enniskillen, during a visit at Florence Court, after the Belfast Meeting of the British Association, September 1852, my attention was called by Prof. M'Coy to a coalshale fossil in a drawer of unnamed and unarranged specimens, which the practised eye of the Professor discerned to present more the characters of a Reptile than of a Fish; and, after a careful scrutiny, I became satisfied that the Professor's surmise was correct, and that the specimen in question presented closer marks of resemblance to the Archegosaurus * than to any known species of fish from the Carboniferous series. At Prof. M'Coy's request, and with the liberal permission of Lord Enniskillen, I brought away the specimen for more detailed comparison with the skeletons of recent Reptilia , and with the fossils and casts of extinct species, available for the purpose, in the Metropolitan Collections; and I now submit to the Geological Society the specimen itself with the results of these comparisons. The specimen (P1. II. fig. 1) consists of the right half of the facial part of the skull, with the short premaxillary (22), long maxillary (21), and broad malar (26) and lacrymal (73), with part of the postfrontal (l2) and squamosal (27) bones, slightly dislocated and squeezed into the shale, with their smooth inner surfaces exposed. A part of the shale from which the bone has been removed shows the impressions of the reticularly sculptured outer surface of the bones. The premaxillary contained a few teeth,