318 PROCEEDINGS OF THE 



in the proceedings of the Society, by sending specimens for 

 exhibition. During a recent tour in the United States, he had 

 visited the mammoth caves of Kentucky, and had there obtained 

 specimens of their blind fauna. These were shown by Mr Archibald 

 Robertson, who read a paper descriptive of the caves and their 

 various inhabitants. Mr Malloch was well known in Glasgow, 

 having been prominently connected with several of the benevolent 

 and charitable institutions of the city. 



SPECIMENS EXHIBITED. 



Mr James Coutts exhibited a number of fine specimens of 

 copalite, a fossil resin from Zanzibar, in which were enclosed 

 insects of various forms, along with bits of wood, leaves of plants, 

 etc. Mr Coutts gave some information regarding the uses to 

 which copalite is applied; and Mr D. C. Glen, F.G.S., also 

 showed a number of examples from the same locality, taken from 

 the collection of Mr James Albert Smith, C.E., one of which 

 enclosed a small and perfect specimen of a scorpion. Mr John 

 Young, F.G.S., made some remarks upon copalite, stating that 

 it was first discovered in the London Clay divisions of the tertiary 

 formation, at Highgate Hill, near London, and named from the 

 locality, Highgate resin. It was afterwards found more abundantly 

 in India. Zanzibar is a third locality for the mineral, where it is 

 found by probing the ground with an iron rod. Mr Young 

 stated that copalite was very closely allied to amber or succinite 

 in its chemical composition and colour, both being resins which 

 had been exuded from various kinds of trees in a semi-fluid 

 condition, and it was while in this viscous state, that insects and 

 impurities got entangled in it. It would be interesting to the 

 members to know that amongst the oxygenated hydro-carbon 

 minerals found in the earth's crust, Bathvillite, named from the 

 Torbanehill cannel, near Bathgate, and even the coal of that 

 locality, approached more closely to copalite and amber in their 

 chemical composition than any other known mineral substance, 

 although the colour and general appearance of the two were 

 very dissimilar. 



Dr Francis P. Flemyng, F.R.G.S., exhibited a very fine 

 specimen of the Gar-fish or Sea-pike, Usox helone, which was taken 

 off Dunoon, in the Firth of Clyde, on the 25th of last May. The 

 head and bones were in good preservation. When alive it 



