There is one complete individual of a species of Phacops from the Orthis-argentea zone of Prendergast Lane, Haverfordwest, showing certain interesting characters which make it worthy of notice. The head is somewhat crushed and imperfect, but the glabella is seen to be large and broad and to expand regularly towards the front; the frontal lobe is transversely rhomboidal and nearly half the total length of the glabella; there are three pairs of lateral lobes, of which the anterior pair is the largest; the second pair is narrower, and the third pair is subequal to the second in size. The first pair of lateral furrows is oblique; the second pair is horizontal and slightly arched forwards; the third pair is slightly oblique and the most strongly marked of all; the occipital furrow is strong and curved forwards in the middle. There is only a narrow median strip of the glabella not crossed by the lateral furrows, for they are rather long and all reach inwards to about the same extent.

The thorax has a prominent axis about three-fourths the width of the pleuræ, which are bent downwards and backwards beyond the fulcrum, which is situated at about half their length. Their extremities are slightly bent forwards and apparently rounded or bluntly pointed; a deep diagonal furrow traverses the whole length of each pleura.

The pygidium is nearly semicircular, with a regular rounded margin, except behind the axis, where there is developed a long, pointed, straight posterior spine, about two-thirds the length of the pygidium.

As I have recently seen certain cases of the curious hollowing out of rocks in Corsica, described by Mr. F. F. Tuckett (with a note from myself) in the January number of this Magazine, for which Mr. Lake suggested an explanation in the following number, I will add something to that note and intimate why I did not refer to desert regions for an explanation. The case which Mr. Lake mentions (“Das Gesetz der Wüstenbildung,” fig. 7) undoubtedly much resembles Mr. Tuckett's photographs, and so, to some extent, do figs. 16 and 17, more especially the latter. With these I was not then acquainted, perhaps having overlooked the book, because I wrote a notice of “Die Denudation in der Wüste,” when it appeared in 1891, and had formed the opinion that the author was disposed to work his hypothesis for rather more than it would stand. As, however, I knew there would shortly be a chance of my getting a glimpse of the Egyptian desert, I postponed stating why I had not suggested that kind of atmospheric erosion. In this region, however, I saw no more than I already knew, but on our return, owing to an unexpected change of plans, we spent an afternoon and part of the next day in harbour at Ajaccio, when, by a lucky chance, I hit upon some curious instances of erosion, which I think may be worth a brief description.

In the paper on the Pendleside group at Pendle Hill, Q.J.G.S., vol. lvii, p. 377, I said, “The further facts of the distribution of Glyphioceras spirale and Posidonomya Becheri set forth in the fore-going pages open up the wide question of the age of the Culm beds of Devon and Germany.” Since then I have had the great advantage of examining suites of fossils from the Lower Culm of Devonshire, collected by Mr. Hamling, of Barnstaple, and Mr. Coom´rasw´my, from the Coddon Hill Beds and other localities in North Devon. I was so interested in the fossils that I found it necessary to go down and examine the beds in which they occurred, and Mr. Hamling gave me the inestimable advantage of his guidance. In this way we examined the Lower Culm and the underlying Pilton Beds in detail from West Leigh to Fremington, and the so-called Middle Culm of Bideford and other places. I was able to see the Hall collection of fossils at Barnstaple, and again to renew my acquaintance with Mr. Hamling's collection. This visit to Devonshire, it seems to me, was fortunately planned after a visit last Summer to the Devono-Carbonif'erous succession in the south-west of Ireland, and a study of the fauna in the collection of the Geological Survey at Dublin and in the Museum of Queen's College, Cork.

The group of beds which I propose to identify and correlate with those known in France, Germany, and Belgium by the name of ‘Gedinnien,’ forming the lowest member of the Devonian system, extends in its full development from the Lizard peninsula in the west to Gorran and St. Austell on the east, and thence to near Newquay on the north. The upper beds, at least, may be traced through Fowey and Looe along the coast, and across the Start peninsula as far as Babbacombe, south of Dartmouth in Devonshire. They are referred to by Ussher as ‘Dartmouth Slates.’ They exist also on the north of the Devonian basin, and are mentioned by Etheridge as underlying the Lower Devonian.

In a paper entitled “Observations on Belemnites,” which was communicated to the Geological Society of London in April, 1823, J. S. Miller defined the genus Belemnites thus: —“A cephalopodous? molluscous animal provided with a fibrous spathose conical shell, divided by transverse concave septa into separate cells or chambers connected by a siphuncle; and inserted into a laminar, solid, fibrous, spathose, subconical or fusiform body extending beyond it, and forming a protecting sheath.” In May of the same year Mr. Miller contributed to the same Society another paper in which he instituted the genus Actinocamax for “spathose bodies which resemble the belemnitic guard in general appearance, but are distinguished from it by presenting, instead of the terminal cavity intended for the reception of the chambered shell, a protruding and convex base.”

Over twenty years ago, in 1882, I ventured to controvert a doctrine which was at the time maintained with remarkable unanimity by all geologists, and which was taught in all the current textbooks. It was that the ordinary ripple-mark of the seashore was formed by continuous water-currents of some kind; the current of water taking the place and performing the office of the current of wind which ripples the surface of sand-dunes.

The name ‘Balangoda group’ is proposed for a series of granitic and pegmatite-like rocks, intrusive in, but distinct from, the Charnockite series; first met with in the Balangoda district, but evidently widely distributed over a large area between Balangoda and Hatton. The rocks are best described as granites, but occur most often in rather narrow dykes, after the manner of pegmatites. Yet there is no reason for separating the smaller from the larger masses, and the term granite is applied to both. The group (of which a more detailed account will ultimately be needed) includes in particular zircon granite, allanite granite, magnetite granite, and granite without conspicuous accessory minerals; as well as the probably similar rocks in which the hitherto unlocated minerals geikielite, baddeleyite, rutile, fergusonite, thorite, thorianite, etc., may be looked for; and the vein of pegmatite at Gampola, which consisted of quartz, felspars, and biotite, with apatite, ilmenite, tourmaline, and the new mineral described as thorianite as accessory minerals.

These granites are intrusive in the Charnockite series, and though frequently occurring in lenticular masses (Denagama) with a disposition parallel to that of the foliation planes of the charnockites, have often been observed to transgress these foliation planes and to behave as intrusive rocks. Contact phenomena have not, however, been observed, except perhaps in a slight tendency to a peripheral fineness of grain in the intrusive rocks. At the junctions granite and charnockite are usually welded together, there being no absolutely hard line of separation, although the junction may be called sharp; in the case of the larger masses no good junctions have been seen.