In a recent visit to Porlock Weir, to see the submerged forest so ably described by Mr. Godwin-Austen in the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society for February, 1866, I availed myself of the opportunity, afforded by the limited time at my disposal, to examine the general contour of the country, and more particularly that part of it relating to the superficial deposits.

There appear to be two or three obstacles in the way of a proper classification of fossil fishes, and of obtaining sufficient data to establish the earliest period cf the earth's formation, during the deposition of which any particular fish existed, the principal obstruction being caused by the disconnected manner in which the researches have been carried on; for palæontologists; as a rule, confine themselves to the fauna or flora of the formations that are most exposed in their localities, either by nature or by the hand of man.

Probably no part of England has received more careful attention from geologists than Devonshire, both North and South, but although the lists of fossils are large, the fossils themselves are often very difficult to determine, owing to the cleavage and metamorphism to which the rocks containing them have been subjected.

This neighbourhood has already been described by several authors, —the most complete account of the Tertiary beds being by Dr. Fraas, Aus dem Orient, 1867. Dr. Figari Bey, in vol. i. of Studi Scientifici sull' Egitto; H, Bauerman, Esq., and Dr. C. Le Neve Foster, in the Quart Journ. Geol. Soc. 1869, vol. xxv. p. 40, have also written on the district, the latter observers referring especially to the occurrence of Celestine in the Moccattam quarries.

In the Geological Magazine (Vol IV. p. 496) I have given some notes on West Indian Geology, with descriptions of a few new species of fossils. The notes were intended, in part, as supplementary to the papers published in the Journal of the Geological Society, and in the Geological Magazine, on the Geology and Palaeontology of the West Indies, and in part to exhibit an improved classification of the Caribean upper and middle Tertiaries.

“Shells having the general form, of Productus, but uniformly with a narrow area on each valve, a foramen or callosity on the ventral area, small teeth, and more or less distinct teeth-sockets. The reniform vascular impression, rising from between the anterior and posterior occlusor muscular impressions, curves gently outwards, and, following a curvature somewhat parallel with the margin of the shell to below the middle of its length, is abruptly re-curved, and the extremity, turned a little backwards, terminates about halfway between the margin and the anterior extremity of the mesial septum. The cardinal process, seen from the inner side, is bilobed, and from the exterior side each of these divisions is usually bilobed.

Having received permission from the Director-General of the Geological Survey of the United Kingdom, I exhibited before the Geological Section of the British Association at Belfast in August last, the Maps and Sections of the rocks forming the hill-country of West Galway and S.W. Mayo, and gave a description of the district, of which the following is an epitome.

As a further contribution to the subject of mountain elevation, of which the Editor of the Magazine has given an interesting and lucid résumé in his late Presidential Address to the Geologists' Association, I send an outline of a paper which was read by me in December before the Cambridge Philosophical Society.

Observations by Mr. Scrope on the subject to which he has so long devoted his attention demand respectful attention, and that I should endeavour to assign my reasons for not agreeing with the strictures which he has made upon my paper, read to the Royal Society in June, 1872.

In the Reader, 14th October, 1865, and afterwards more fully in my papers on the “Boulder-clay of Caithness,” and on the “ Transport of the Wastdale Crag Blocks,” 2 the following were shown from physical considerations to be necessary results, viz.:—

1. That were the ice of Greenland much thicker than it is at present, which it evidently was during the Glacial Epoch, it would not float in Davis Straits and Baffin's Bay, and consequently, would not break up into icebergs, but would move over upon the North American continent in one continuous mass, and pursue its course southwards, until it gradually melted away under the influence of the Sun's heat.

In mapping the boundaries of the Lias in that part of Yorkshire where the Cretaceous rocks overlap the Jurassic, the Red Chalk becomes extremely useful as a guide, especially as the springs constantly break out beneath it, and give good opportunities for its examination and that of the subjacent strata. Some points of interest have thus obtruded themselves upon one's notice. Its range in Yorkshire may be described as first northwards and then eastwards. Though much covered, by Boulder-clay in the latter portion, it may be traced almost step by step along the former, except where it appears to be absent.

While spending a few days in the Autumn at Tramore, I chanced to meet with a well-marked example of recent alteration of shore-level; and as on subsequent examination I find it only partially noticed on the Six-inch Map, and not referred to at all on the published One-inch Sheet, or in the Memoir of the Geological Survey of the District, I thought of laying a short note on the subject before this Society.

In the Geological Magazine, Vol. VIII. 1871, p. 247, I gave a short account of the composition and structure of a Phonolite which forms the mass of the Wolf Rock lying between the Land's End and the Scilly Islands. The account there given has been noticed by Prof. Zirkel in a work recently published, in which he refers to my description of some of the crystals stated to be nepheline, and suggests that they may be nosean. The passage to which, he refers is as follows:—“The grey dust filling some of the crystals is frequently collected together so as to form a dark or even black mass in the centre, the edges of which are sharply defined, and correspond exactly with those of the crystal. Hexagonal crystals, for example, exhibit a border filled with a fine grey dust, and a central portion occupied by a well-defined black hexagon, or there is sometimes a black band running parallel with, and at some distance from the sides.” To this I may now add, that some of the crystals and irregular grains are traversed by a number of very fine straight lines of a bluish-black colour, and that with a high magnifying power these lines are resolved into rows of extremely minute dark granules similar to those forming the dust. This remarkable structure, combined with that previously given, is so thoroughly characteristic of nosean that there can be no doubt of its presence in the rock; the mineralogical composition of which is thus found to be in complete accordance with that of the large series examined by Zirkel.

Having been engaged for some time in collecting and studying the organic remains of the Corniferous Limestone and Hamilton formation of the western portion of the Province of Ontario, I propose, in the present communication, to describe some of the new species which have come under my notice, these being chiefly referable to the groups of the Corals and the Polyzoa. A portion of the new material which I have collected I have already described in the “Annals of Natural History” and in the “Canadian Naturalist,” and a portion still remains for more extended examination. Some of the species here described, also, will be fully illustrated in the detailed Report on the Devonian Fossils of Western Canada, which I am now preparing for the Government of the Province of Ontario. Under any circumstances, the Corniferous and Hamilton deposits of Western Canada are so richly fossiliferous, that more extensive investigations than I have been able to carry out would certainly result in the bringing to light of numerous new forms of animal life. The total number of species comprised in my collections from these formations amounts to about one hundred and sixty or seventy, of which between thirty and forty are apparently new; but in the case of some of these the materials at present in my hands are not sufficient for description. Of this number no less than seventy-five belong to the corals, about forty are Braohiopods, and the remainder are distributed amongst the Polyzoa, Gasteropoda, Lamellibranchiata, Annelida, Trilobita, and Crinoidea.

Let us now consider the recent drifts that in other places are being formed at the present day. In portions of the sea-coast of Western Ireland, but especially in Galway and Mayo, there are clifis of glacial drift margining the Atlantic. These are degrading away yearly, the detritus being carried away to form submarine and estuarine deposits.

The cause of the formation of mountains is so difficult and so vast a question that I cannot undertake to answer all Captain Hutton's objections to what he concisely calls the “contraction” theory. Moreover, I feel that, as far as my endeavours can help to elucidate so great a subject, I shall do better to throw what I have further to say into a form which is not controversial. I desire not to be held a champion of any theory, and shall always honestly abandon any position, which subsequent consideration leads me to think untenable. Thus with respect to paragraph (7), p. 26, in Captain Hutton's rejoinder to my critique, I refer to the abstract I have sent to the Magazine of my paper lately read at Cambridge, for it supersedes some of the purely tentative suppositions to which Captain Hutton takes exception, and which I adopted six years ago as “not unreasonable,” in order to test the application of the theory.