HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



91 



Thereupon I broke the stem and applied the broken 

 end to my tongue, which took off the drop of white 

 fluid exuding from it. Soon I felt a burning in my 

 throat, by reason of which I lay awake all night. 

 Being visited next morning by my medical attendant, 

 who had not yet given me up as cured, and finding 

 me worse than I had been on the day before, he said 

 that I must have eaten something which had dis- 

 agreed with me. My mother, who was then living, 

 assuring him that I had eaten nothing worse than a 

 rasher of bacon, he would not admit that to be the 

 cause of the unfavourable symptoms he observed, and 

 I felt it my duty to confess what I had done, which 

 was accepted as an explanation of my relapse, from 

 which, however, I soon recovered. Since then, I 

 have not met with any person who has suffered from 

 the same cause, and I have been credibly informed 

 that the plant which was injurious to me may be 

 eaten with safety by rabbits. Thus it appears that 

 what may be safely eaten by another animal may be 

 very dangerous to man, and that what one person may 

 partake of innocently, might be the means of suicide 

 for another. Let your readers meditate on this before 

 they venture on experiments with fool's parsley. — 

 John Gibis. 



GEOLOGY. 



The Permian, Triassic, and Liassic Rocks 

 OF THE Carlisle Basin. — At a recent meeting of 

 the Geological Society a paper on this subject was 

 read by Mr. T. V. Holmes, F.G.S. The district 

 discussed in the author's paper was worked over by 

 him when engaged on the Geological Survey, and 

 consists of those parts of Cumberland and Dumfries- 

 shire which adjoin the Solway. Its southern bound- 

 ary is, approximately, a line ranging from Maryport 

 to Rose Castle on the river Caldew, and touching 

 the Eden about two miles above Wetheral. On the 

 east and north-east its limits are the immediate 

 neighbourhoods of the junction of the rivers Eden 

 and Irthing, Hethersgill on the Hether Burn, 

 Brackenhill Tower on the line, and the Border 

 boundary on the rivers Esk and Sark ; and in Dum- 

 friesshire the small tract south of a line ranging from 

 the junction of Scots Dyke with the Sark on the 

 north-east, to Cummertrees on the south-west. The 

 lowest bed in this area is the great Upper Permian 

 or St. Bees Sandstone, which occupies a belt of 

 country in the neighbourhood of the outer boundary. 

 Directly above St. Bees Sandstone, in the west of 

 the district, lies a formation consisting of shales with 

 gypsum, which, though 700 feet thick in tlie neigh- 

 bourhood of Abbey Town, is nowhere visible, but 

 is known solely from borings, the country west of 

 the Caldew, and of the Eden below the junction of 

 the two streams, being thickly drift-covered and 

 almost sectionless. In the east of the district the 



St. Bees Sandstone is overlain directly by a soft, red, 

 false-bedded sandstone, called by the author Kirk- 

 linton Sandstone, from the locality in which the 

 rock is best seen, as well as its relations to the 

 under- and overlying beds. But while there is no 

 evidence of any unconformity between the St, Bees 

 Sandstone and the overlying gypseous shales in the 

 west, there is evidence of a decided unconformity 

 between the St. Bees and Kirklinton Sandstones in 

 the east. In Carwinley Burn (for example), which 

 runs into the Esk at Netherby, only from 200 to 300 

 feet of St. Bees stone was seen below the outcrop of 

 the Kirklinton, instead of the 1000 to 1500 feet 

 which piobably exist about Brampton on the one 

 hand and in Dumfriesshire on the other. Yet Car- 

 winley Burn affords an almost continuous series of 

 sections, from the (non- faulted) Permian-Carbon- 

 iferous junction to some distance above the outcrop 

 of the Kirklinton Sandstone. As, in addition, the 

 shales underlying the St. Bees Sandstone are gyp- 

 seous, both near Carlisle and at Barrowmouth, close 

 to St. Bees Head, the author classed the (Upper) 

 gypseous shales as Permian, and the Kirklinton 

 Sandstone as Bunter. Resting unconformably on 

 the Kirklinton Sandstone, in the district between 

 Carlisle and Kirklinton, are the marls seen on the 

 Eden, between Stanwix and Beaumont, and on the 

 line between Westlinton and Cliff Bridge, Kirklinton. 

 Their unconformity is shown by the fact that on the 

 line they rest on the lower, or red, beds, and be- 

 tween Stanwix and Beaumont on the upper, or white, 

 beds of the Kirklinton Sandstone. The marls have 

 therefore been classed as Keuper. So far as the 

 evidence goes, they appear to be very thin and to 

 extend but a very small distance south of the Eden. 

 Lastly, the Lias appeared to the author to be uncon- 

 formable to all the beds below, and to rest partly 

 on the gypseous shales, partly on the Kirklinton 

 Sandstone, and partly on the Keuper Marls. Of the 

 existence of Rhretic beds there was no evidence, all 

 fossils hitherto found having been determined by 

 Mr. Etheridge (President) to be Lower-Lias forms. 

 But the Lias sections are so small and few in 

 number, and the ground so persistently drift- 

 covered, that only a boring could settle the question. 



The Late Professor Pennant. — A familiar 

 figure in English geology has just passed away. 

 Professor James Pennant, whose mineralogical shop 

 in the Strand was for years a house of call_ for all 

 young country geologists who visited London, has 

 just died at the good old age of seventy-three. 



Aquaria.—' ' Rita " would be glad to know the way 

 to start aquaria, both fresh and sea water, for 

 microscopic work, and if there is any book published 

 specially devoted to this subject. General books on 

 aquaria do not treat of animalcules. 



