Page:The Habitat of the Eurypterida.djvu/33

 limestone of Scotland, equivalent in age to the Mississippic of North America, has yielded three species of Eurypterus: scabrosus, Woodward, scouleri Hibbert and ''? stevensoni'' Ethridge. Of the first species a doubtful fragment has been reported from Eskdale, Scotland. Hibbert was the first to describe as a Eurypterus the two nearly complete individuals and three or four fragments found in the Burdiehouse fresh-water limestone at Kirkton, near Bathgate, West Lothian. The organic remains are scattered through in no regular order and are not confined to the limestone particularly, but occur in the sandy beds above and below, not in particular seams. One of the eurypterid remains had earlier been described under the name Eidothea, but Hibbert rightfully called it Eurypterus scouleri (116, 280, 281, pl. XII). Vegetal matter is diffused through the limestone and in this fossil plants are well preserved, the form particularly abundant being Sphenopteris affinis. Microscopic Entomostraca abound which have been named by Hibbert Cypris scoto-burdigalensis, and a microscopic mollusc approaching Planorbis also occurs. Fish remains are abundant: Gyracanthus farmosus Agassiz, ganoid and sauroid teeth, and many coprolites are found. Woodward says of this limestone: "it is a fresh water deposit, and abounds in bands of silex alternating with calcareous matter and presents all the appearance of having been deposited by thermal waters during the Carboniferous epoch" (312, 180). The third species above referred to was described by Etheridge from a few fragmentary spines found in a light-colored micaceous sandstone of the Cement-stone group in Kimmerghame quarry, near Dunse in Berwickshire, Scotland. In the same shire Peach has recently discovered some fragments for which he erected the genus Glyptoscorpius, a eurypterid which had combs, and walking feet ending in two claws. In the Calciferous sandstone here at Lennel Braes, near Coldstream, Berwickshire, a specimen of G. perornatus Peach showing five body segments much broken, and a number of combs, referred to G. caledonicus (Salter) have been found. Besides these, are a number of fragments referred to the genus Glyptoscorpius, but specifically unidentifiable (209, 516–525). At the River Esk, four miles south of Langholm, Dumfriesshire, the two species of Glyptoscorpius are found with the following associates: several species of Phyllocarida, Ceratiocaris scorpioides Peach, C. elongatus Peach; Peracarida, Anthrapalaemon etheridgei Peach, A. parki Peach, A. traquairii Peach, A. macconochii, A. formosus Peach, Palaeocrangon eskdalensis Peach, Palaeocaris scoticus Peach, and later discoveries