22 The Irish Nahtralist. 



which must have been the forerunners of more finished t^-pes, and held 

 that trace of man's existence mij^htbe expected in an interglacial deposit. 

 Mr. F. W. Lockwood considered that further information and evidence, 

 both as to the nature and age of the deposit, and as to the flints in 

 question, were necessary, before it could be proved that traces of man 

 occurred in the Ball3-rudder gravels. Mr. vS. A. Stewart did not consider 

 that the flints on exhibition showed any sign of human workmanship. 

 Mr. R. Lloyd Praeger held that the deposit in question could not possibly 

 be considered interglacial, as its fauna was more intensely boreal than 

 even that of the Boulder Clay, the term interglacial signifying a cessation 

 of glacial conditions. A recommendation was sent forward to the Com- 

 mittee that a systematic exploration of the Ballyrudder deposit should be 

 undertaken. 



Mr. Francis Joseph Bigger gave a notice of an amphora recently 

 obtained by sponge-divers in the Bay of Ekanjik, near Rhodes, which 

 was on exhibition. 



INIr. R. Lloyd Praeger exhibited and described a large skull of the Irish 

 Elk {Cerviis giganieiis) recently obtained in the centre of a bed of peat three 

 feet thick, at a depth of thirty-four feet below high water mark, in 

 excavations made for a wall of a new branch floating dock at Spencer 

 Basin, Belfast. Above the peat were some thirty feet of blue marine 

 clays. This series of deposits has been fully described by Mr. Praeger in 

 a paper recently read before the Royal Irish Academy. 



March 15th — Microscopical Evening. This was the P'irst Annual 

 Meeting of the Microscopical Section of the Club. The Committee, 

 presented the Annual Report, and the evening was devoted to an 

 exhibition of microscopical objects and appliances, the exhibits being 

 illustrative of a microscopical survey of the animal kingdom. Some twenty 

 microscopists attended with their instruments, and there was a large 

 gathering of members and visitors. 



DUBININ NATUR-\I.ISTS' FIEI.D CLUB. 



Feb. 9th.— The President, Dr. E. J. McWeeney, in the Chair. Mr. 

 J. M. Browne, B.A., gave a paper on "Some Coleoptera from the Dublin 

 District." (This paper, which includes several new records, will be shortly 

 published in the Irish Naturai^ist.) Messrs. H. K. G. Cuthbert, W. F. 

 de V. Kane, and G. H. Carpenter took part in the discussion, which 

 turned chiefly on the famous Mesites tardyi, and the bearing of its distri- 

 bution, and that of some other Irish animals, on the problem of the 

 former physical geograph}- of Western Europe. 



March 8th. — The President in the Chair. Mr, T, Chandlee read a paper 

 entitled, "The Multiplication of vSpecies," in which he dealt with the 

 recent changes of nomenclature in systematic botany, and deplored the 

 extent to which "splitting" has been carried by some naturalists, speciall}^ 

 in the genera Kosa, Rubus, and Ilieracium. Specimens were exhibited 

 showing different forms of leaves on the same plant, believed to in- 

 dicate a transition between supposed species. Mr. H. C. Hart, Professor 

 Johnson, ]Mr. W. F. de V. Kane, Mr. G. H. Carpenter, and Professor 

 Cole took part in the discussion. ]SIessrs. Kane and Carpenter showed 

 some critical species and varieties of Ivcpidoptera Mr. F. Neale sent for 

 exhibition some Lepidoptera from the Limerick district ; one of these, 

 Nisoniades tages, from Cratloe, Co. Clare, had not before been taken in 

 the localit}'. 



ARMAGH NATUR-\I, HISTORY AND PHII^OSOPHICAIv SOCIETY. 



January nth.— Rev. W. F. Johnson, President, in the Chair. Mr. W. 

 H. Phillips, of Holywood, read a most interesting paper entitled, " A 

 Gossip about British Ferns." The lecturer referred to the remarkable 

 number of varieties of the British Ferns, and enumerated the chief 



