An Account of the Tongue of a Pastinaca Marina, Frequent in the Seas about Jamaica, and Lately Dug up in Mary-Land, and England. By Hans Sloane. M. D.

from Nov. 24. 1686. to the same Day 1687. IV. De Figurarum Geometricè irrationarium Quadraturis. Autore Johanne Craig. V. Part of a Letter of Mr. Robert Tredwey, to Dr. Leonard Pluketnet, Dated Jamaica, Feb. 12. 1695. giving an Account of a great piece of Ambergrise thrown on that Island; with the Opinion of some there about the way of its Production. I. An Account of the Tongue of a Pastinaca Marina, frequent in the Seas about Jamaica, and lately dug up in Mary-Land, and England. By Hans Sloane. M. D. Dr. Tancred Robinson, Fellow of the College of Physicians and Royal Society, did me the favour some time since; to show me a considerable number of Fossil Bones and Shells of several sorts he had latley come to his hands from Mary-Land. Some of them had received little alteration in the Earth, others more, and some were so changed as to be stony, but all of them retain'd their ancient shape so well, that it was easie for any body, who remembred the Figures of the parts of those Animals, to conclude these Fossils must have come from the same Original. One of these Fossils (of which I never remembred to have seen any before except a little piece with Mr. Pettiver) I had the favour of the Doctor to carry home with me to compare with the Tongue of a Fish I had observ'd observ'd in Jamaica; and on setting it and the Fossil together, and comparing them with another of the same Tongues in pieces which I saw in Mr. Charleton's, most useful and admirable Collection of Natural Curiosities; we found a perfect agreement of the Tongue that was dug up in Mary-Land, and that taken from the Fish in our Collections. It was the Opinion of some, that these Bones were the pieces of a petrified Mushroom, the Lamellæ of which this Fossil in some manner resembled; but to demonstrate what they were, I had leave of Mr. Charleton and Dr. Robinson, to shew them at a Meeting of the Royal Society, and to take their Figures that they might be grav'd, together with the whole Tongue I had myself. This is done in the Plate belonging to this Transaction: where Fig. 1. Is the whole Tongue of a flat Fish akin to the Thornback, call'd Pastinaca Marina, &c. It is made up of many Bones (about Nineteen in this) which are each of them crooked, their two sides making an obtuse Angle, such as the sides of the under mandible of a Man does; the uppermost sides of these several Bones have Furrowes and pieces standing together after the manner of the Teeth of a short small tooth'd Comb, the extant ends of which answer the like parts in the Bones of the upper Jaw of this Fish, between which and this Tongue the Food of this Fish is to be cut, torn, or ground to pieces. One instance of the many admirable contrivances of the Wise Creator, in providing all Creatures with Organs proper to their several necessities. Fig. 2. Is the under side of the same divided into several pieces also, but having no Furrows or Teeth, as those of the upper side have. Fig. 3, and 6. Shew the Joints or pieces of the same Tongue, separated and in several Positions of their upper and under Sides, to show the perfect Agreement is between the pieces of the Tongue of the Fish taken lately from it, and those taken out of the Earth, which are Figur'd in the like Positions at No 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, & 12. Fig. 13. & 14. Are the upper and under sides of what, I suppose, is the upper Mandible or Palate of this Fish, which is opposite to, or answers this Tongue: The agreement of this in all parts with the Tongue making it very likely to belong, if not to this same, yet to this kind of Fish. Du Tertre in his Histoire Naturelle des Antilles p. 217. calls this Fish Autre sorte de Raye Marcgrave, ed. 1648. p. 175. Piso. ib. Lib. 3. p. 58. & ed. 1658. Lib. 5. p. 293. as well as Mr. Willoughby and Ray, Hist. Pisc. p. 66. call it Nari-Nari, and give a further account of it. I shall also have occasion to speak more of this Fish in my Observations on the Fishes about the Island of Jamaica, of which this is one, and which I there call Pastinaca Marina, Lavis, livida, albis maculis notata. I am apt to believe the Anonymus Portugal, whose description of Brasile is published in Purchas, Lib. 7. cap. 1. p. 1313. means this, when he says, there were Rayes, having in their Mouth 2 Bones breaking wilks with them. A Part of one of the Joints of this Tongue was dug up in England, and given to Mr. Charleton, by Mr. Lhuid of Oxford, by the Name of Siliquastrum Subnigrum peclinatum maximum. Dr. Robinson thinks the Fossil Palate or Mandible Fig. 13, and 14. may be of the same kind with that taken notice of by Lachmund, in his Book de Lapidibus, p. 17. where 'tis call'd Pentacrinos.