156 Miscellaneous. 



regard all these germs as nearly allied to blood-corpuscles, especially 

 as Dr. Barry has so pertinently asked how many tissues there are that 

 the corpuscles of the blood may not form. It is remarkable, how- 

 ever, that both the ruddy and the pale organic germs of fibrinous 

 clots are irregular in shape, and exhibit nuclei when treated with 

 acetic acid, while precisely the same treatment does not show any 

 nuclei in the free or floating blood- discs. If, therefore, the organic 

 germs of fibrine be blood-corpuscles entangled in the clot, these cor- 

 puscles must have undergone changes both in form and in chemical 

 characters. A figure is given in which the germs are exhibited in a 

 mesh of delicate fibrils, together with many very minute circular 

 molecules. The fibrils are also depicted in the fibrine obtained by 

 washing from the blood of the oviparous Vertebrata, which fibrine is 

 further characterized by containing many particles similar to, and 

 probably identical with, the nuclei of the blood-corpuscles. — Ibid. 



Discovery of a Chambered Univalve Fossil in the Eocene Tertiary of 

 James River, Virginia. By M. Tuomey. 



Thinking that it may possess sufficient interest, the following 

 notice of the discovery of a Nautilus in the Eocene on James River, 

 is communicated. 



Mr. Lyell, during his visit to this portion of the tertiary of the 

 United States, directed my attention to the broken link in our great 

 cretaceous formation, presented by Virginia. At his suggestion, I 

 determined to observe any fossils that may come under my notice, 

 with a view to the elucidation of this interesting point. The libe- 

 rality of Capt. H. H. Cocke, U. S. N., afforded me a good opportu- 

 nity of examining the fossils of the well-known eocene locality at 

 Evergreen, near City Point, James River. Capt. Cocke, at the in- 

 stance of Edward Ruffin, Esq., editor of the ' Farmer's Register,' 

 who is engaged in the investigation of the tertiary of Lower Virgi- 

 nia, caused a shaft to be sunk at the base of the escarpment at the 

 locality just mentioned. In this shaft, and at a depth of about twenty 

 feet below the level of tide -water, the fossil referred to was found. It 

 was imbedded in the dark- coloured tenacious clay containing much 

 greensand, common to some of the eocene strata of this region. The 

 exterior of the shell is much decayed, but the pearly surface of the 

 interior is well preserved, and by removing portions parallel to the 

 aperture the concave septa and siphunculus can be seen. It was 

 associated with eocene species of Turritella, Crassatella, Pectunculus, 

 a small Panopcea, and a little lower in the same stratum was found a 

 gigantic Ostrea, measuring in height eight and a half inches, breadth 

 five and a half inches, and weighing five pounds. The upper valve 

 of this Ostrea agrees with the description of 0. percrassa, Conrad, 

 but in the lower valve the cartilage fosset is deep. The muscular 

 impression in each valve exhibits a cavity extending upwards into 

 the substance of the shell about two inches. A person seeing but 

 this huge individual, and the common form of O. compressirostra, 

 Say, found in the same stratum, would pronounce them distinct spe- 

 cies ; but I am in possession of a suite of specimens showing the in- 



