Page:VCH Kent 1.djvu/88

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A HISTORY OF KENT described from the Swiss Cretaceous, is represented both in the Gault of Folkestone and the Lower Greensand of Maidstone. In the alHed genus Edaphodon we have E. sedgwicki, typically from the Lower Greensand of the Isle of Wight, in the Folkestone Gault, and perhaps also in the Chalk-marl of Dover ; while a second species, E. laminosus, is typically from Folkestone. In a very different group of fishes the pycnodont ganoids are represented by Ccelodus ellipticus, a large species known only by a single specimen of the dentition from Folkestone preserved in the collection of the British Museum. In the herring group the genus and species of Elopidce known as Thrissopater salmoneus were described on the evidence of Folkestone specimens. In another family Portheus gaultinus, already referred to, is typically from Folkestone ; and the same is the case with Ichthyodectes serridens, of which only the type specimen appears to be known. The remains of both reptiles and fishes appear to be comparatively rare in the Lower Greensand of the county, although special interest attaches to some of the former. Most interesting of all perhaps is a large slab of sandstone from the Kentish Rag (Hythe beds of the Lower Greensand) from near Maidstone, preserved in the British Museum, and containing a considerable portion of the skeleton of the great herbivo- rous, bipedal, terrestrial dinosaurian reptile Iguanodon mantelli. This fine specimen, obtained in 1834 by Mr. W. H. Bensted, is generally regarded as the type of the species, which is itself the type of the genus. The name Iguanodon was however given by Mantell on the evidence of teeth from the Wealden of Sussex, and refers to a supposed resemblance existing between these teeth and those of the South Ameri- can lizards known as iguanas. A cast of the complete skeleton of a larger species of Iguanodon, from Belgium, is exhibited in the Natural History Museum. A dinosaur known only by a series of broken bones of the limbs and pelvis from Lower Greensand of Hythe has been described under the name of Dinodocus mackesoni, and is the sole representative of its genus. It may be allied to the Jurassic Cardiodon {Cetiosaurus). The large marine saurian known as Polyptychodon continuus, to which reference has been made in an earlier portion of this article, is typically from the Lower Greensand of Hythe and Maidstone. Another reptile from the latter locality is one of the long-necked plesiosaurians, named Cimolio- saurus latispinus. Fragments of the skull of a chelonian reptile from the Lower Greensand of Maidstone have been made the types of a genus and species under the name of Protemys serrata ; but their affinity is uncertain, and they appear to have been lost. In addition to Ischyodus thurmanni, already referred to, the fishes of the Lower Greensand of the county are represented by two sharks, Synechodus tenuis from Maidstone, and a species from near Folkestone, which may be identical with the Swiss Odontaspis studeri. The former species is at present peculiar to Kent. 42