Until quite lately no fossils had been found in the Lower Cambrian of Bethesda. Indeed we had almost given up the hope of obtaining any evidence of the life of the period represented by them, because of the great alteration in the character of the rock resulting from the severe mechanical action to which it had been subjected. The announcement that Mr. Robert Lloyd had discovered fossils in the uppermost slate beds of the Penrhyn Quarries was therefore received with great interest, which was increased when it was found that some of these were in a sufficiently perfect state for determination, and that they were referred by Dr. Woodward to a new species of a well-known Lower Cambrian genus of Trilobite.

It has long been recognized by geologists that rock-masses which have undergone movement, and have thereby been subjected to internal stresses, exhibit, as the consequence of the action upon them of such mechanical forces, unmistakeable evidences of having been greatly modified, alike in their mineralogical and in their structural characters. That the most complete and striking examples of such changes are to be found in the rock-masses which constitute mountain-chains—rock-masses which have actually been made to “flow,” and in so doing have been subjected to shearing movements of the most intense character—was clearly pointed out by Scrope, Darwin, Sharpe, Naumann, and Dana; all of whom referred the foliated structure exhibited by such rock-masses to this cause.

The following account of the Proboscidea, by Prof. E. D. Cope, appeared in a recent number of the “American Naturalist” and is so interesting, that we venture to give the more important part in full, and some few of the illustrations.—Edit. Geol. Mag.

Those who have carefully studied the crystalline schists cannot fail to have noticed that a community of structure—a sort of family likeness—prevails throughout any one group of rocks, while those which occur apparently at different horizons exhibit dissimilar structures. Thus the marbles associated with any group of crystalline schists are coarse or fine in grain, according to the structure of the latter. But to this rule exceptions appear, at first sight, not infrequent. For instance, in the Alps, we find not uncommonly, in that group of schists which seems to occupy the highest position, marbles which present an abnormally compact aspect. On closer examination they prove indeed to be crystalline in structure, but the crystals seem so small, the general structure so compact, that until we find them graduating into typical mica or other schists, we can hardly feel satisfied we are not being duped by infolded limestones of Mesozoic or Palæozoic age.

The convergence of opinion is now so strong that the climate of Siberia in the Mammoth age was sufficiently temperate to enable trees to grow where only the bare tundra is at present found (if it does not necessitate our extending the forest zone at least as far north as the Liachof Islands), that it becomes at once interesting and important to consider under what conditions such a result would be forthcoming.

Next to the metamorphic region of the Northern Highlands there is perhaps no area in Britain where the strata have been so contorted and convulsed as in the great Lower Palæozoic region of the Southern Uplands of Scotland, and it is only by the zonal method of stratigraphy that these complexities can ever be successfully unravelled. So far as the present results of the application of that method enable us to judge, it appears that, underlying all these stratigraphical complexities, there is, in reality, a broad tectonic structure of great simplicity. For, if we make exception, on the one hand, of the lowest strata (the Ballantrae or Arenig rocks), which, as we have seen, only rise to the surface within the limits of the Ballantrae district; and on the other hand of the highest formations (Wenlock-Ludlow), which merely skirt the Upland plateau upon its north-west and south-west flanks, we find that almost the whole of the Lower Palæozoic strata of the Uplands are naturally grouped in two grand lithological terranes, viz. (I.) a Lower Terrane (Moffat Terrane), including strata ranging from the Upper Llandeilo to the Upper Llandovery; and (II.) an Upper Terrane (Gala or Queensberry Terrane), embracing strata generally of Tarannon age.

The problem of the metamorphism of rock-masses is one in which increased study has not led to unanimity of opinion. The literature of the recent Geological Congress in London suffices to remind us, how widely divergent are the conclusions to which various geologists have been led by researches in the field. Since, then, the a posteriori line gives such very different results in different hands, it may be worth while to revert for a moment to the deductive method, and try to trace the consequences, in this connexion, of admitted physical principles.

The following notes were drawn up by the writer some years since as a sketch for an excursion by members of the Geologists' Association to the Alps, and it may perhaps still prove acceptable to geologists who this year intend to visit Switzerland for the first time.

Coming along the cliffs from Boscastle towards Tintagel, at the part just seawards of the village of Trevalga, and between the outlying rocks known as “Short Island” and “Long Island,” we see one or two limited outcrops of a schistose rock different from the surrounding slates, shales, etc. A thoroughly good sight of it is not, however, obtained till we reach the extreme north side of Bossiney Cove, a little way south of Long Island, when a very fine exposure of the sheet in question is observed, lying in among the sedimentary rocks, sharply marked off from them at contact, so that the junction-lines can be seen distinctly even from some distance.

Since the works of Agassiz and Egerton, few contributions have been made to the knowledge of British Jurassic “Ganoid” and “Teleostean” Fishes, and a considerable amount of undescribed material has thus accumulated in various collections. Much more progress has been made upon the Continent, where the Lithographic Stones of Bavaria, Würtemberg, and Ain, especially, yield a rich assemblage of forms in a remarkable state of preservation; and it is now an interesting study to compare the British Jurassic fossils with their well-known continental allies. Such an undertaking is facilitated by the recent appearance of Prof. Dr. K. A. von Zittel's admirable critical summary of the extinct Mesozoic fishes; and it is the object of the present notice to offer some preliminary remarks upon a few of the more prominent types observed by the author in English collections.

The recent notice of the life and work of Prof. Henry Carvill Lewis, whose lamented death occurred in Manchester, July 21st, 1888, in his thirty-fifth year, well indicates the wide range of his scientific labours. He published valuable results of investigations in astronomy, mineralogy and petrology, and especially in glacial geology, the last being based on his exploration of the drift and its terminal moraines in the United States, and later in Ireland, Wales and England. The present article reviews his contributions to our knowledge of these drift formations and of the history of the Ice Age, bringing into comparison and correlation the glacial records of America and Europe. Comprehensive as were Professor Lewis' observations and studies in this field, he was planning yet more thorough and extensive exploration of the drift in Britain, Germany and Scandinavia, when he was taken from us.

In a former communication (Geol. Mag. Dec. III. Vol. IV. No. 9, p. 396, 1887), when pointing out how Reinecke's Amm. serpentinus had been misunderstood, I gave as a synonym, but with a query, Sowerby's Amm. Strangewaysi. As I have, since then, examined the type-specimen of the latter species contained in the collection of the Natural History Museum, and as Mr. E. Walford kindly forwarded me for my determination a capital specimen from Byfield, I have been able to satisfactorily settle the identity of these forms. Except being evolute carinate Ammonites, the two species have hardly a feature in common.

Discoidal, compressed, hollow-carinate. Whorls flattened, ornamented with genuine sickle-shaped ribs, which, though less conspicuous in size on the body-chamber, are there more distinctly bent. Ventral area marked by the prolonged forward sweep of the ribs, and surmounted by a well-marked hollow-carina.

The stone-rivers of the Falkland Islands have been described by Mr. Darwin, Sir Wyville Thomson, Dr. Coppinger, and other naturalists who have visited those regions. The accounts given by the two first-named are well-known and easily accessible, and render a full description here unnecessary. But it may not be out of place to summarise the principal features of the stone-rivers, which must find an explanation in any satisfactory theory of their origin.

They consist of angular blocks of quartzite, “arranged,” according to Pernéty, “as if they had been accumulated carelessly to fill the ravines.” The blocks are from two to twenty feet long, and rest “irregularly one upon the other, supported in all positions by the angles and edges of those beneath” (Thomson).

“The study of any new science,” says Alexander v. Humboldt, “may be compared to a journey to distant lands. Before starting in company with others, the question as to the practicability of the journey is raised; while examining one's own powers, the qualities of fellow-travellers are looked upon with distrust. It is feared—perhaps without just reason—that they might cause unpleasant detention. In our time the difficulties of an undertaking of this kind are much diminished. Any confidence is founded on the bright blossoming state to which natural sciences have grown, their wealth being no more the abundant quantity, but the concatenation of what has been observed.”

In an article published in the Geological Magazine for August, 1888, an outline was presented of some facts resulting from recent investigations on the glaciation of British Columbia and adjacent regions, bearing more particularly on the flow of ice in a northerly direction brought to light by explorations in the Yukon district, but touching also on the south-eastern extension of the great western glacier-mass of the continent, which I have proposed to name the Cordilleran glacier. Field-work carried out by me during the summer of 1888 has resulted in the accumulation of many new facts relating to the southern part of the area, which was at one time covered by the Cordilleran glacier, from which it would appear that it may ultimately be possible not only to trace the various stages in the recession of the main front of the great confluent glacier beneath which the interior or plateau region of British Columbia was buried, but even to follow the later stages of its decline as it became broken up into numerous local glaciers confined to the valleys of the several mountain ranges which limit the plateau.

The felsites of the south-east of Ireland are shown on the maps, of the Geological Survey to extend over considerable areas in counties Wicklow, Wexford and Waterford. Like the Welsh felsites they are contemporaneous with Lower Silurian (Ordovician) strata, and were probably erupted on an old sea-bottom. They are accompanied by abundant deposits of tuffs and breccias, the component fragments of which consist mainly of felsite.

The origin of the Triassic rocks of Britain is a question that has excited from time to time much interest and varied speculation. The entire absence of fossils in the Lower Trias or Bunter Sandstone has led the majority of geological reasoners to look to causes other than marine action for an explanation of its characteristic features. The late Mr. Godwin-Austen was of opinion that the whole of the Triassic rocks were laid down in freshwater lakes which, passing through the brackish stage, become finally saturated with saline matter through evaporation exceeding the inflow of fresh water. It has been felt, however, by other geologists, that this theory, while accounting fairly well for the upper deposits of the Triassic age, does not fit in with the phenomena of current bedding, the presence and distribution of the numerous quartzite and other well-rounded pebbles, and the comparative absence of marl-beds, which distinguish the Lower Trias or Bunter Sandstones.

During June last I visited the Fullers Earth Pits at Nutfield, near Redhill, Surrey, with the London Geological Field Class, when Professor Seeley suggested to me that I should make an analysis of the deposit. This I have been enabled to do through the kindness of the manager (A. Sheridan, Esq.), who was good enough to send me a series of samples of the earth, and the various products prepared from it. The Nutfield Fullers Earth is a heavy blue or yellow clay, with a greasy feel and an earthy fracture. The sample No. 1 contained 27·47 per cent. and No. 2, 29·56 per cent. of water before drying.

The remains of Dinosaurian reptiles are very abundant in the Rocky Mountain region, especially in deposits of Jurassic age, and during the past ten years the author has made extensive collections of these fossils, as a basis for investigating the entire group. The results of this work will be included in several volumes, two of which are now well advanced towards completion, and will soon be published by the United States Geological Survey.

In the study of these reptiles, it was necessary to examine the European forms, and the author has now seen nearly every known specimen of importance. The object of the present paper is to give, in few words, some of the more obvious results of a comparison between these forms and those of America which he has investigated.

The commonly-received theory that most coal-seams represent vegetable matter that has grown and has been entombed on the spot has never been received by all geologists with quite that measure of satisfaction that has been accorded to other theories of the same general nature. It has been felt again and again that the explanation referred to might be true enough for certain cases; but that in others it failed to account satisfactorily for all the phenomena. It involved too many complications—too nice an adjustment of the rate of growth of the vegetation to the rate of subsidence and of sedimentation—too much straining of the theory in question generally—to be accepted unhesitatingly by those accustomed to judge of such facts for themselves. That certain beds of coal have been formed by the growth of vegetation on the spot no reasonable person can doubt: the only question is whether that is true of every coal-seam.