PALAEONTOLOGY 1267014 represented in the Chalk of the county by two species of the extinct genus Hoplopteryx. The first of these, H. iewesiensis (the Zeus kwcsiensis of Mantell, and the Beryx ornatus of Agassiz and Dixon), was named on the evidence of a specimen from Lewes now in the British Museum ; the second, H. superbiis (the Beryx superbus of Dixon), was described from a Southeram fossil, and has also been collected at Brighton. Another member of the same family, Hotnonotus dorsalis, described from a Kentish specimen in the Brighton Museum, and the only known representative of its genus, also occurs in the Sussex Chalk. A family [Stromateida) more nearly allied to the mackerels is represented in the Chalk of the county by Berycopsis elegam, a genus and species founded on a Lewes specimen in the Brighton Museum, and also recorded from Clayton. Another specimen in the same collection, from Steyning, described by Dixon as Stenostoma pulchellum, may indicate a second species of the same genus. Finally, in the family of horse-mackerels or Carangidce we have a species from Washington near Worthing, originally described as Microdon nuchalis, but now known as JEpichthys nuchalis ; the other member of the genus occurring in the Cretaceous of Istria and the Lebanon. The Wealden formation being of freshwater origin, it is only natural to expect that it should yield remains of mammals, since those animals were in existence long before the epoch in question. Hitherto however only two specimens which can be regarded as undoubtedly mammalian have been obtained from Wealden strata, both of these coming from Hastings. The first is a molar tooth of a very small mammal identified by its describer. Dr. Smith Woodward,^ with a Purbeck genus, and named Plagiaulax dawsoni its geological horizon is the Wadhurst Clay. The second specimen, an incisor tooth, is from the Tilgate Grit, and was described by the present writer,^ although not named. The lower end of a leg-bone (femur) from Ansty Lane near Cuckfield has been described by Professor H. G. Seeley ^ as probably belonging to a Wealden bird, but the opinion has been expressed that it is crocodilian rather than avian. Among the reptiles of the Wealden, remains of several species of pterodactyles, or flying saurians, have been described, several of these specimens having been originally regarded as referable to birds. Pro- visionally, at any rate, all these pterodactyles may be included in the Cretaceous genus Ornithochirus. The species O. clavirostris was founded on part of an upper jaw from the Hastings Sands of St. Leonards ; O. clifti, which is known from Battle, Cuckfield, Hastings and Tilgate Forest, is typified by imperfect wing-bones (humerus) ; O. curtus, of which the exact locality is unknown, is represented by part of a leg- bone (tibia) in the collection of the British Museum ; and O. cuvieri, typically from Kent, appears to be represented by a specimen from Newtimber in the Brighton Museum. The so-called Pterodactylus 1 Proc. Zool. Soc. London, 1891, 585. 2 Quart. Jouni. Geo/. Sot. xlix. 281. ^ Ibid. Iv. +16. 35
