4G 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



[Feb. 1, 1SG9. 



Piece of Coal. — Allow me to correct two glar- 

 ing mis-statements in the "Story of a Piece of Coal," 

 with which your fifth volume commences. The 

 Honorary Secretary of the Norwich Geological 

 Society there states "that, during the carboniferous 



5>eriod, there stretched across what is now central 

 England, a hilly barrier, which separated two coal- 

 formations going on contemporaneously.''' A rough 

 sketch (fig. 40) will show the fallacy of this hypo- 

 thesis better than mere description. The coal-mea- 

 sures were deposited conformably over the Millstone 

 Grit, and it was not till after the close of the car- 

 boniferous period that the upheaval of the range 

 occurred. It is easy to imagine the continuation of 

 the beds which have been cut off by denudation 

 subsequently. But the next error is still more 

 glaring. I refer to the statement that the moun- 

 tain limestone was formed simultaneously with the 

 coal-measures ! Considering that the mountain 

 limestone underlies the latter by several thousand 

 feet of Millstone Grit, I think it is needless to 

 comment upon this most novel hypothesis. — W. II. 

 Button, Geol. Survey. 



January, 1669; Quarterly Journal of Geological 

 Society, vol. xxii., pp. 590, 470, 599 ; M. Agassiz, 

 Poissons Fossiles, 8 vols. ; Ditto, Du Vieux Gres 

 Rouge ; Transactions of Manchester Geological 

 Society, vol. i., p. 10; Transactions of Tvneside 

 Naturalists' Field Club, vol. vi., p. 231; Owen's 

 Odontography ; Owen's Palaeontology ; Owen's 

 Homology of the Vertebrate Skeleton ; Buckland's 

 Geology and Mineralogy ; Pace's Handbook of 

 Geology; Page's Geological Terms; Chambers's 

 Encyclopaedia; Proceedings of the Palseontographical 

 Society ; Acadian Geology by Dawson, pp. 179, 

 353; Proceedings of North of England Institution of 

 Mining Engineers ; Sedgwick and McCoy's British 

 Palseozoic Fossils ; Miller's Footprints of the 

 Creation ; Science - Gossip ; Scientific Opinion. 

 From any of the works enumerated valuable infor- 

 mation may be derived. — T. P. Parkas, Neiocastlc- 

 on-Tyne. 



Substitute for Nose-pieces. — There is an 

 error in the description of my sketch (fig. 15, in the 

 number for last month). I wrote, or should have 



Coal-mearures. 2. Millstone-grit. 



The Nightingale. — I read in the Western Morn- 

 ing News of this day (January 11th) that " the valley 

 between Liskeard and Moorswater (in Cornwall) is 

 now tenanted by a nightingale, which warbles 

 enchanting, but untimely music." Is it not a very 

 unusual occurrence at this season of the year and in 

 that locality?—^/. J. Davy, Torquay. 



Gkowtii in Greengage. — In the month of July 

 last year, I was preparing to eat a fine-looking 

 greengage, when on opening it to remove the stone, 

 [ found the kernel had germinated, and a radicle 

 had appeared at one end of the stone, which was 

 partly open, and a delicate primule at the other. 

 As it looked healthy, I carefully closed the fruit 

 around it, and planted it en masse, but am sorry to say 

 it perished, 1 believe owing to the continuous rain. 

 —II. P. 



Books and Pafebs on Carboniferous Faun.e. 

 — 1 have had numerous applications to recommend 

 works in which information may be had respecting 

 carboniferous faunae, and as there is no single work 

 in which the information at present possessed has 

 been condensed and illustrated, L beg that you will 

 permit me to refer your readers to some of the many 

 sources from which valuable information may be 

 obtained : — Annals of Natural History, February, 

 April, May, June, 1S0S ; Proceedings of the Geo- 

 logical Society, vol. xviii., p. 2'.)1 ; vol. xix., p. 03; 

 Transactions of Royal Irish Society, vol. xxiv., p. 351, 

 plate 19; Memoirs of Geological Society, 1859, 

 p. 52 ; Ditto, Decades vi. and x ; Transactions of 

 Geological Society, series ii., vol. vi., plate 43, fig. 1; 

 Owen's Dental Characters of Genera and Species of 

 Fishes and Reptiles from Low Main Coal-seam, 

 Northumberkmd ; Geological Magazine, vol. vi., 

 pp. 323, 378 ; Ditto, Aug., Nov., Dec, 1S0S, and 



done so, lower end of " body," and 'not, as printed, 

 " object-glass." (Of course the upper end of object- 

 glass goes into the lower end of body.) — James Vogan. 

 [It is printed as our correspondent wrote it; 

 hence the error is his own.— Ed. S. G.\ 



To repair Corallines. — Can any one inform 

 me how to mend a piece of coralline from the Mau- 

 ritius ? Arabian cement and plaster of Paris have 

 been tried, but without success. — F. II., Eastbourne. 



[Is it a coral or a coralline ? — Ed. S. G.] 



Dendritic Spots. — I have for a length of time 

 been puzzled to know what these are. They cer- 

 tainly look like some fungoid growth, but I cannot 

 feel so sure about it as " J. T. G." I have often 

 tried, but can find no spores, neither can I make 

 out that the spots grow, nor yet increase in number, 

 as they would do were they a kind of fungus ; ana 

 I cannot find them on all sorts of paper. 1 have 

 now by me two kinds of foolscap which have been 

 kept in the same place. One sort abounded in spots 

 when I had it, but they have certainly not become 

 more numerous during the past year or more. On 

 the other lot of paper, about half a ream, I can find 

 none. May they not be some crystallization which 

 takes place in the making of the paper ? I have 

 looked into some old books which have got rather 

 discoloured with damp, but do not find them, though 

 there is a black fungus of quite a different appear- 

 ance which is produced, and does grow and increase. 

 Perhaps " J. T. W." can procure and figure the 

 spores, which would set the matter at rest as to the 

 vegetable nature of the spots. — E. T. Scott. 



Luminous Centipede.— While walking in the 

 garden one night with a friend, we observed a 

 luminous appearance on the walk by the side of the 

 lawn. It looked like a number of luminous grains 



