166 



NOTES AND EXHIBITS. 



Mr. Maiden exhibited a number of vegetable products — fruits, 

 seeds, gums, essential oils, and timbers — in illustration of his 

 papers. Also specimens of a number of interesting indigenous 

 (N.S.W.) plants including Palmeria scandens, F.v.M., from Bulli ; 

 Calllcarpa pedunculated, R.Br., and Alchornea ilicifolia, F.v.M., 

 from the Richmond River; Telopea oreades, F.v.M., and Persoonia 

 chamcepeuce, Lh., from the southern portion of the colony. 



Mr. T. W. Edgeworth David exhibited, on behalf of Mr. J. E. 

 Carne, F.G.S., Mineralogist to the Department of Mines, Sydney, 

 a specimen of precious opal from the White Cliffs about fifty miles 

 northerly from Wilcannia. Precious opal and common opal have 

 lately been discovered in this locality in a formation corresponding 

 to the Desert Sandstone of Queensland. The opal occurs dissemi- 

 nated as an infiltrated cement throughout the mass of the sand- 

 stone in places, and also replacing the calcareous material of 

 fossils. It also occurs in cracks in the sandstone and in fossil 

 wood, which is somewhat plentifully distributed throughout the 

 sandstone, and occasionally replaces part of the original woody 

 tissues of the silicified trees. 



Mr. A. Sidney Olliff stated that he had recently had an oppor- 

 tunity of examining a collection of Coccinellidce gathered by Mr. 

 A. M. Lea, among which he had found specimens of the lady-bird, 

 Vedalia cardinalis, obtained at Mossman's Bay, near Sydney. 

 This capture is interesting from the fact that the species has not 

 previously been observed by our local collectors. Mr. Olliff also 

 showed, under the microscope, specimens of larvae and females of 

 Phylloxera vastatrix, the vine pest ; and he remarked that, so far, 

 he had not yet been able to find either specimens of the leaf-form 

 of the pest, or reliable records of its having been observed in New 

 South Wales. 



