THE COUNCIL. 13 



cera, and plants, and a very extraordinary species of fish, 

 different entirely from those in the collection of the Leeds 

 Society, which were obtained from a higher part of the coal 

 series of Yorkshire. 



It has also been long known that in connection with coal- 

 seams, at a considerable height above this layer of marine 

 remains, there occur in Yorkshire and Derbyshire, several 

 bands, as they are termed, of shells admitted to belong to the 

 fresh-water genus, unio. 



To these distinct zoological indications of a marine origin 

 for the lower part of the carboniferous series, and a fresh-water 

 origin for the upper parts, Mr. Phillips has added the important 

 fact, that, in the neighbourhood of Halifax, shells referred to 

 the fresh-water genus, unio, occur in a layer at some depth 

 behw the layer of marine shells, parallel thereto, and separated 

 therefrom by two seams of coal. 



This is therefore a case analogous to some examples in the 

 series of tertiary strata, from which it has been inferred that 

 the same basin has experienced periodical alternations of 

 marine and fresh-water currents. And, if the zoological cha- 

 racters may be depended on, we are assured that, of the old 

 carboniferous formation in the north of England, the whole of 

 the lower part associated with limestone, is of marine origin, 

 but that the whole of the upper part, which has no limestone, 

 is of fresh-water origin, while the intermediate series shews, 

 in one situation, a definite alternation of the deposits of the 

 sea and fresh waters. 



The MiNERALOGiCAL collcctiou has been enriched with many 

 additions, and especially by the valuable contributions of Mr- 

 Loscombe and Mr. Came. The latter gentleman, residing in 

 Cornwall, having had his attention directed to one of the So- 

 ciety's Reports, in which the deficiency of the Museum in the 



