IV.—The Search for Uintacrinus in England and Westphalia

Extract

It is just a score of years since the unstalked crinoid Uintacrinus was discovered, almost simultaneously, in the Niobrara Chalk of Kansas and the Lower Senonian of Westphalia. The American specimens were described by Grinnell and Meek, while the single European specimen was exhaustively discussed by Schlueter. Of recent years further specimens, in a better state of preservation, have been found in Kansas, and a slab purchased by the British Museum enabled me to make a more detailed study, the results of which were published in the Proceedings of the Zoological Society (vol. 1893, pp. 974–1004, pls. liv–lvi, April, 1896). But as to the occurrence of Uintacrinus in Europe, our knowledge at the beginning of 1896 remained as in 1876; not even from Reckling-hausen, the original Westphalian locality, had another fragment been obtained. It may therefore be a surprise to many to learn that Uintacrinus is one of the commonest fossils of the Marsupites zone, not only in the Marlstone of Westphalia, but in the Chalk of our own island, and probably at the same horizon in a good many other countries.