Note AS — Chapter IX

May I crave the attention of the reader to a brief statement of fact? I have said that Professor Fleming, when he minutely described the scales of the Holoptychius, hazarded no conjecture regarding the generic character of the creature to which they had belonged; he merely introduced them to the notice of the public as the scales of some "vertebrated animal, probably those of a fish." I now state that he described the scales of a contemporary ichthyolite as bearing, in external appearance, a "close resemblance to some of the scales of the common sturgeon." It has been asserted, that it was the scales of the Holoptychius which he thus described, "referring them to an extinct species of the genus Accipenser;" and the assertion has been extensively credited, and by some of our highest geological authorities. Agassiz himself, evidently in the belief that the professor had fallen into a palpable error, deems it necessary to prove that the Holoptychius could have borne "no relation to the Accipenser or sturgeon." Mr. Murchison, in his Silurian System, refers also to the supposed mistake. The person with whom the misunderstanding seems to have originated is the Rev. Dr. Anderson, of Newburgh. About a twelvemonth after the discovery of Professor Fleming in the sandstones of Drumdryan, a similar discovery was made in the sandstones of Clashbennie by a geologist of Perth, who, on submitting his new found scales to Dr. Anderson, concluded, with the Doctor, that they could be no other than oyster shells; though eventually, on becoming acquainted with the decision of Professor Fleming regarding them, both gentlemen were content to alter their opinion, and to regard them as scales. The Professor, in his paper on the Old Red Sandstone in Cheek's Journal, referred incidentally to the oyster shells of Clashbennie—a somewhat delicate subject of allusion; and in Dr. Anderson's paper on the same formation, which appeared about seven years after, in the New Journal of Professor Jameson, the geological world was told, for the first time, that Professor Fleming had described a scale of Clashbennie similar to those of Drumdryan, (i. e., those of the Holoptychius,) as bearing a "close resemblance to some of the scales on the common sturgeon," and as probably referable to some "extinct species of the genus Accipenser." Now, Professor Fleming, instead of stating that the scales were at all similar, had stated very pointedly that they were entirely different; and not only had he described them as different, but he had also figured them as different, and had placed the figures side by side, that the difference might be the better seen. To the paper of the Professor, which contained this statement, and to which these figures were attached, Dr. Anderson referred, as "read before the Wernerian Society;"—he quoted from it in the Professor's words—he drew some of the more important facts of his own paper from it—in his late Essay on the Geology of Fife he has availed himself of it still more largely, though with no acknowledgment; it has constituted, in short, by far the most valuable of all his discoveries in connection with the Old Red Sandstone, and apparently the most minutely examined; and yet, so completely did he fail to detect Professor Fleming's carefully drawn distinction between the scales of the Holoptychius and those of its contemporary, that when Agassiz, misled apparently by the Doctor's own statement, had set himself to show that the scaly giant of the formation could have been no sturgeon, the Doctor had the passage in which the naturalist established the fact transferred into a Fife newspaper, with, of course, the laudable intention of preventing the Fife public from falling into the absurd mistake of Professor Fleming. There seems to be something rather inexplicable in all this; but there can be little doubt Dr. Anderson could satisfactorily explain the whole matter without once referring to the oyster shells of Clashbennie. It is improbable that he could have wished or intended to injure the reputation of a gentleman to whose freely-imparted instructions he is indebted for much the greater portion of his geological skill—whose remarks, written and spoken, he has so extensively appropriated in his several papers and essays—and whose character is known far beyond the limits of his country, for untiring research, philosophic discrimination, and all the qualities which constitute a naturalist of the highest order. Dr. Johnston, of Berwick, in his History of British Zoöphytes, (a work of an eminently scientific character,) justly "ascribes to the labors and writings" of Professor Fleming "no small share in diffusing that taste for Natural History which is now abroad." And as an interesting corroboration of the fact, I may state, that Dr. Malcolmson, of Madras, lately found an elegant Italian translation of Fleming's Philosophy of Zoölogy, high in repute among the elite of Rome. Lest it should be supposed I do Dr. Anderson injustice in these remarks, I subjoin the grounds of them in the following extracts from professor Fleming's paper in Cheek's Journal, and from the paper in Jameson's New Edinburgh Journal, in which the Doctor purports to give a digest of the former, without once referring, however, to the periodical in which it is to be found:—

"In the summer of 1827," says Dr. Fleming, "I obtained from Drumdryan quarry, to the south of Cupar, situate in the higher strata of yellow sandstone, certain organisms, which I readily referred to the scales of vertebrated animals, probably those of a fish. The largest (see Plate II., fig. 1, 'figure of a scale of the Holoptychius') was one inch and one tenth in length, about one inch and two tenths in breadth, and not exceeding the fiftieth of an inch in thickness. The part which, when in its natural position, had been imbedded in the cuticle, is comparatively smooth, exhibiting, however, in a very distinct manner, the semicircularly parallel layers of growth with obsolete diverging striæ, giving to the surface, when under a lens, a reticulated aspect. The part naturally exposed is marked with longitudinal, waved, rounded, anastomosing ridges, which are smooth and glossy. The whole of the inside of the scale is smooth, though exhibiting with tolerable distinctness the layers of growth. The form and structure of the object indicated plainly enough that it had been a scale, a conclusion confirmed by the detection of the phosphate of lime in its composition. At this period I inserted a short notice of the occurrence of these scales in our provincial newspaper, the Fife Herald, for the purpose of attracting the attention of the workmen and others in the neighborhood, in order to secure the preservation of any other specimens which might occur.

"Nearly a year after these scales had been discovered, not only in the upper, but even in some of the lower beds of the Yellow Sandstone, I was informed that oyster shells had been found in a quarry in the Old Red Sandstone at Clashbennie, near Errol, in Perthshire, and that specimens were in the possession of a gentleman in Perth. Interested in the intelligence, I lost no time in visiting Perth, and was gratified to find that the supposed oyster shells were, in fact, similar to those which I had ascertained to occur in a higher part of the series. The scales were, however, of a larger size, some of them exceeding three inches in length, and one eighth of an inch in thickness. Upon my visit to the quarry, I found the scales, as in the Yellow Sandstone, most abundant in those parts of the rock which exhibited a brecciated aspect. Many patches a foot in length, full of scales, have occurred; but as yet no entire impression of a fish has been obtained.

"Another scale, differing from those already noticed, (see Plate II., fig. 3, 'figure of an oblong tubercle plate traversed diagonally by lines, which, bisecting one another a little above the centre, resembles a St. Andrew's cross, and marked on the edges by faintly radiating lines,') is about an inch and a quarter in length, and an inch in breadth. In external appearance it bears a very close resemblance to some of the scales on the common sturgeon, and may, with some probability, be referred to an extinct species of the genus Accipenser."—(Cheek's Edinburgh Journal, Feb. 1831, p. 85.)

"Dr. Fleming, in 1830," says Dr. Anderson, "read before the Wernerian Society a notice 'on the occurrence of scales of vertebrated animals in the Old Red Sandstone of Fifeshire.' These organisms, as described by him, occurred in the Yellow Sandstone of Drumdryan and the Gray Sandstone of Parkhill. From the former locality scales of a fish were obtained.... The same paper (Professor Fleming's) contains a notice of similar scales in the Old Red Sandstone of Clashbennie, near Errol, in Perthshire, one of which is described as bearing 'a very close resemblance to some of the scales on the common sturgeon, and may with some probability be referred to an extinct species of the genus Accipenser.'"—(Professor Jameson's Edin. New Phil. Journal, Oct. 1837, p. 138.)