Abstract
IN a recent visit to the South Loggius, in Nova Scotia, in which I was assisted in the examination of the cliff by Mr. Albert J. Hill, Manager of the Cumberland Coal Mine, we found a number of well-preserved shells of Pupa vetusta, in the indurated clay, filling an erect sigillaria, in a bed considerably higher than those in which the shell was previously known. It is nearly in the middle of group xxvi. of my section of the South Loggius, 222 feet above the main coal-seam, 842 feet above the bed in which the species was first recognised by Sir C. Lyell and myself, and about 2,000 feet above the lowest bed in which I have yet found it. It thus appears that this little pul-monate continued to flourish in the carboniferous swamps, after its remote ancestors had been covered with 2,000 feet of sediment, including many beds of coal, and nearly the whole thickness of the productive coal-measures. Conulus priscus, the only other land-snail found in this section, on the other hand occurs only, so far as known, in the lowest of the beds above-mentioned. Two other carboniferous land-shells, Pupa vermilionensis, Bradley, and Dawsonella Meeki, Bradley, have been found in the coal-field of Illinois; and it is worthy of remark that, according to Dr. P. P. Carpenter, all the four species belong to distinct generic or sub-generic forms, and that all these forms are still represented on the American Continent.
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DAWSON, J. Carboniferous Land Shells . Nature 14, 317 (1876). https://doi.org/10.1038/014317a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/014317a0