Continuing the notice of Herr H. Monke's paper on the Trilobite-bearing limestone slabs of Yen-tsy-yai, the author observes:—The very dense and solid, slightly arenaceous limestones of Yen-tsy-yai consist of horizontal slabs (from 1–2½ cm. thick) of a dark bluish-grey colour, [p. 109] Whilst showing no traces of fossils in their interior, the limestone slabs are on one side (as shown on pl. ix) often completely covered with the remains of Trilobite carapaces, besides which are found only isolated very minute shells of Brachiopoda. Between them are here and there irregular, lengthened furrows, which may be the tracks of the Trilobites; on the corresponding opposite pails of the slabs are similarly shaped vermiform protuberances. It follows that the fossiliferous side is to be considered as the natural upper part of the slabs. In a certain number of the slabs either both sides or one only are covered besides by a thin argillaceous stratum, which equally contains, though less frequently, delicate remains of fossils; in all the other slabs the fossils present themselves en relief and often rest on a small base of limestone, and therefore convey the impression of having been originally covered by a thin argillaceous stratum, which later on was washed away by water.

The huge masses of chalk in the glacial drift on both sides of Cromer, and especially at the headland near Trimingham, have for many years attracted the attention of geologists. In this Magazine (Dec. II, Vol. VII, 1880, p. 55) and in the Survey Memoir on the Geology of the Country around Cromer, published in 1882, Mr. Clement Reid ascribes those at the latter place to the advance of an ice-sheet by which the chalk has been thrust up into a kind of fold and the flint layers have been bent, illustrating his interpretation by a diagrammatic section. We visited the Cromer cliffs for the first time in 1892, and after a careful examination of the Trimingham headland, not only felt more strongly than before certain weak points in Mr. Reid's reasoning, but also observed some facts difficult to reconcile with his conclusions. Since that date we have more than once visited these sections, and found last April that comparatively recent inroads of the sea had made great changes which had shown the relations of the chalk and glacial drift to be, in our opinion, incompatible with Mr. Reid's interpretation.

Lightning Creek occupies a wide valley in a weakened zone in the series of rocks known as the Cariboo schists. It has been stated by Mr. Bowman (Canadian Geological Survey, 1885 and 1886), and confirmed by later observations, that the centre of the deepest known erosion follows very closely the anticlinal axis in these schists. The occurrence of the very rich spots for which this stream is justly famous, both below its present level and at points many feet above it, have long been a source of discussion amongst the miners who worked here. It is hoped these notes gathered during three years studying this difficult problem may be of assistance to future observers, and perhaps lead to the discovery of rich benches in hitherto unsuspected places.

By the courtesy of my friend Mr. Herbert Bolton, the Curator and Secretary of the Bristol Museum, several specimens have been placed in my hands for examination. They were collected by Mr. Peter Whalley from the ‘Soapstone bed,’ a little distance above the ‘Bullion Mine’ (or ‘Mountain Four Feet’) on the hill near Colne, Lancashire, and he permits me to figure and describe them.

All the specimens are enclosed in small, elliptical nodules of clayironstone, evidently formed around the organisms by a process of concretionary action at the time of their embedment in the sediment forming the layer in which the nodules occur, the fossils being, as usual in such cases, exposed by splitting the concretions open along their periphery

The specimens on which the following notes are based were JL collected by Mr. H. T. Ferrar, M.A., F.G.S., while on a tour through New Zealand, during the time the “Discovery” was being overhauled in Lyttelton, on her return from the Antarctic. The topographical and field notes were also supplied by Mr. Ferrar, and it must be clearly understood that only the detailed petrographical descriptions are the work of the present writer.

The specimens were obtained near the middle of the North Island of New Zealand, and in the area marked “acidic volcanic rocks” in Sir James Hector's geological map of New Zealand, published in 1883. They all occur in the Taupo zone, the hot-lake district which lies roughly between Lake Taupo on the south and Lake Rotorua on the north.

The following petrographical notes refer to examples of igneous rocks collected by the writer during a visit to the Transvaal in the Summer of 1904. Thin sections of the rocks have since been made, and it was thought the following condensed accounts of their appearances might perhaps prove a useful record.

My friend Professor Lapworth kindly sent me, for identification, in July last the split portions of two nodules containing examples of the interesting little Crustacean genus Cyclus, from the ‘Pennystone’ Ironstone of the Coal-measures near Dudley, obtained by Miss Ethel M. R. Wood, M.Sc., of the University of Birmingham, and I have obtained permission to publish a note thereon, supplementary to my paper in 1894. In that paper I described, among other species, one which I named Cyclus Johnsoni (op. cit., Pl. XV, Figs. 4–7, pp. 537–538), from the Coal-measures, Coseley, near Dudley, which is identical with Miss Wood's specimens. As one of these latter displays some further details of appendages I have given a figure of it here as tending better to elucidate the structure of this curious genus. (See Woodcut on p. 491.)

The following descriptions are based upon fossils sent to me for determination by Mr. Howard Fox, F.G.S. Excepting the specimen which is compared with Orthoceras hercynicum and is marked “E. of Cant Cove,” the fossils are from Cant Hill, St. Minver, N. Cornwall.

At the end of the descriptions are added notes upon some very imperfect fossils which Mr. Fox has collected from other localities in St. Minver.

I was much interested in the account of the ‘erosion’ of rocks in Corsica given by Mr. Tuckett and Professor Bonney respectively in the January and August numbers of the GeologicalMagazine for 1904, more especially as I have been long acquainted with similar phenomena in Madagascar, and have, equally with the authors mentioned, been long puzzled to find an explanation of their origin at all satisfactory.

The fragments of partially weathered chert from North China sent by the Rev. S. Couling, unfortunately without indication of the particular locality or formation where they were collected, are of whitish, slate-grey, or pinkish aspect, and in two instances show traces of banded structure. They consist of cryptocrystalline or microcrystalline silica with small areas in which the silica is of a fibrous chalcedonic character. Remains of organisms can be distinguished in each of the four microscopic sections which have been prepared, but they are generally so shadowy and indefinite that their nature cannot be satisfactorily determined. Some portions of slide marked A are crowded with slender, straight, or slightly curved linear bodies, about .11 mm. in length by .01 mm. in width, which in places have a sub-parallel or sheaf-like arrangement. They might be supposed to be sponge spicules, but in their size and disposition they seem to differ from any fossil spicules with which I am acquainted. Slide C largely consists of numerous small, rounded, oval, and conical forms without walls, ranging from .1 to 1.7 mm. in diameter. In outline and in size many of these bodies might be compared to Radiolaria, but as they are now not sharply delimited from the clear matrix, but by a granular structure-without other features, it would be rash to assert, save upon further evidence, that they belong to these organisms. In slide D there are some well-defined circular bodies, .03 to .1 mm. in diameter, with clear solid walls, and not infrequently a central spot in each, which very much resemble transverse sections of sponge spicules, and it is possible that this may be their true nature, but some doubt rests on this owing to the apparent absence in the slide of longitudinal sections of spicules.

Nearly forty years ago Mr. R. D. Darbishire obtained from the Glacial gravel of Bowdon, Cheshire, a facetted pebble, which I afterwards had the privilege of describing (Proc. Geol. Assoc., xvi, pp. 396–420, pl. xi, June, 1900). The conclusion then reached was that the pebble bore witness to the action of blown sand at a period during or not long before the deposition of that particular bed of Glacial Drift. Since, however, the pebble was in other respects similar to pebbles common in the Bunter beds, and since some had supposed the existence of desert conditions in those Triassic times, there remained the possibility, and to some minds the probability that the pebble in question had received its facets during the Triassic epoch. It may, therefore, be useful to draw attention to a distinctly facetted pebble from the Boulder Clay within twenty -five miles of Bowdon. This was found by Mr. W. D. Brown, of Burscough (north-west of Ormskirk, Lancashire), at about three feet below the surface in the Burscough Brick Company's clay pit. The pebble is composed of a greyish micaceous sandstone, weathering yellow, and too coarse and loose in texture to be capable of taking a polish. The facets on it, however, are clearly cut, and do not appear to have undergone much, if any, subsequent abrasion. Its greatest length is 37.5 mm.; greatest width, 29.5 mm.; greatest thickness, 7.9 mm. What was probably its uppermost surface, during the latest period of its exposure to wind action, shows a flat central area, of irregularly pentagonal outline, surrounded by five facets, of which one is slightly concave, one rather irregular, two slightly convex, and the last markedly convex and probably retaining the original curved surface of the pebble.

For other references and synonyms, see Miss E. C. Jelly's “A Synonymic Catalogue of the Recent Marine Bryozoa, including Fossil Synonyms,” 1889, pp. 162–164.

The following species of Brachiopoda were recorded by Messrs. Marr & Roberts from the Ordovician beds of the Haverfordwest district:—

During a journey through Russian Armenia in 1893 Mr. H. F. B. Lynch ascended Ararat and collected a number of small specimens from that mountain and other parts of the country. These, after his return, he placed in my hands, requesting me to examine them. At that time he intended to include my report in a book then in preparation, which was completed after a second journey (through the Turkish provinces) in 1898. On this occasion he was accompanied by Mr. Felix Oswald, B.Sc., who studied the geology of the country and collected numerous specimens. Mr. Lynch accordingly decided to omit from his work all geological details, and leave these to be dealt with separately by Mr. Oswald. But some time must still elapse, owing to the pressure of official duties, before he will have completed the work, and as they did not, on the second journey, go near Ararat, I have decided, since the mountain has so much historic interest, to publish my notes, though a little has already appeared on this subject. Herr H. Abich, to whose unwearied labours we are so greatly indebted for information about the geology of Asia Minor, ascended Ararat on July 29, 1845, and Dr. F. Becke has described the microscopic structure of three specimens which he brought down. One is from the summit, another from a parasitic cone, Takjaltu, on the south-east slope, and a third from the same slope of Little Ararat. Mr. Lynch's collection, as will be seen, is a much larger one, so that it gives a more complete idea of the materials of the mountain.

There are several kinds of acid volcanic rocks in Wales. In the X neighbourhood of Snowdon there are at least five kinds, as follows:

1. There are undoubted lavas, showing lines of viscous flow and sometimes vesicular, and weathering into cubical blocks. Such may be seen on Crib Goch and on Crib Yddysgl, on Cerrig Cochion, and elsewhere. These rocks are rarely cleaved.

2. There are rocks like the last as to fracture and mode of weathering, but which are neither viscous nor vesicular. They are probably masses of felsitic dust or mud. Such may be seen in Cwm Llan.

3. There are also massive felstones, rudely cleaved, such as form Moel Meirch. and Clogwyn Llwyd.

4. There are the so-called ashes of various kinds, usually wellbedded and often highly cleaved.

5. Lastly, there are highly cleaved felsitic rocks, which show no lines of viscous flow, are generally unbedded, and which are in many places fragmentary.

Among the numerous Lepidodendroid remains in the Geological Department of the British Museum (Nat. Hist.), there is one which presents several characters of unusual interest. It is a cast, obtained from the Middle Coal-measures of South Staffordshire, near Dudley, and belongs to the Johnson Collection.

A portion of the specimen is figured on p. 209. It will be noticed that the mammillated leaf-cushions are distant from one another, and are separated by broad bands of striated bark. This is an unusual feature in the case of British Lepidodendra. The preservation is fairly good, except in the details of the leaf-scar. In the specimen thirteen leaf-cushions are represented, forming portions of five spiral series. The cushions are rhomboidal in outline, and at first sight do not appear to be very sharply marked off from the bark. On closer inspection, however, they are seen to be moderately well defined, although the lateral angles are flattened and obscured by the encroachment of the bark. They measure from 1.8 to 2 cm. in length, and from .6 to .7 cm. at their greatest width. The upper and lower extremities lie in one plane, which is the median plane of the cushion, and are inclined neither to the right nor to the left (of. Lepidodendron serpentigerum). The cushions stand out in high relief, and depart somewhat from the form of a low truncated pyramid so commonly seen amongst Lepidodendra. However, this is in no wise remarkable, for examples of Lepidodendra having raised cushions are not rare, in cases where the stems have to some extent escaped crushing.

Proceeding westward, the fauna again increases in richness. The molluscan fauna of the Gulf of Kiel has been elaborately described by Meyer and Möbius in their well-known work entitled “Fauna der Kieler Bucht.” They thus enumerate the shells found there:—

Since it has been proved that large areas of basaltic and other igneous rocks withinor near the Tropics in India, on the Seychelles, and in Australia yield surface deposits (so-called Laterites) identical with Bauxite, it is of great importance to ascertain exactly what products of decomposition or weathering originate from corresponding rocks in a temperate climate.

Having been desired by my friend Miss Caroline Birley to examine two Crustaceans in nodules from the Mekran Coast— part of a much larger series, mostly enclosing fossil shells, described by Mr. R. B. Newton, F.G.S. (see ante, pp. 293–303)—I gladly comply with the request to add a note thereon to his paper.

The first concretion, when broken open, displays the dorsal aspect in impression and counterpart of a small crab, 5½ cm. broad by 3 cm. deep, having one long, slender, forcipated chela, imperfectly preserved, measuring nearly 5 cm. in length; and part of one of the fifth posterior pair of feet, adapted for swimming, showing it to have been near to the family Portunidæ, to which our common shore-crabs of the genus Portunus belong. None of these, however, can be satisfactorily compared with the fossil crab from Ormara, which is certainly referable to another genus.

What are popularly termed the Banket Beds of Johannesburg have for years past been justly celebrated for their extraordinarily large and steady gold production. Their literature has already assumed formidable dimensions, so it is unnecessary for my present purpose to give a detailed account of the features they present. They form part of what is generally known as the Witwatersrand Series, which consists of highly altered sandstones and conglomerates almost certainly of Archæan age. They unconformably overlie the banded rocks known as the Hospital Hill Beds, and are overlain by the Dolomite, often termed the ‘Olifants Klip’ or ‘Elephant Rock.’