1865.] BILLINGS— PALAEOZOIC FOSSILS. 425 



more impressive than hearing, so what we hear orally delivered 

 makes upon us a stronger impression than that which lies on a 

 printed page on which our attention may or may not dwell. The 

 other is the stimulus given to enquiry by the mere fact of investiga- 

 tions of this kind, or the result of them, being brought prominently 

 or conspicuously before the public. Men go home with their 

 heads full of subjects on which they perhaps never thought 

 seriously before ; and since, as I believe, nothing once known is 

 ever really forgotten, since an idea which has once found lodg- 

 ment in the mind, though its presence there may long have been 

 barren, and though we ourselves may have been unconscious of it, 

 will often spring up into life, after a long interval, it is difficult to 

 determine what crop will not grow, sooner or later, out of the seed 

 thus cast about apparently at random." 



The following counsels to the readers of papers and speakers in 

 the discussions, might be advantageously given to other bodies as 

 well, and with them I shall close these notes ; 



" Let me only offer to those who take part in our discussions 

 one or two suggestions. The first is, time runs fast, You can 

 say all you have got to say in a few words, if you will think it 

 over beforehand. It is want of preparation, want of exact thought, 

 that makes diffuseness. Again : we don't want preambles or per- 

 orations. We are not a school of rhetoric;, and in addressing an 

 educated audience a good deal may be taken for granted. Lastly, 

 we only wish to get at the truth of things. All ideas are welcome, 

 but mere verbal criticism is of no value to us." J. W. D. 



NOTICE OF SOME NEW GENERA AND SPECIES OF 

 PALAEOZOIC FOSSILS. 



By E. Billings, F.G.S. 



Genus Calapoecia, (N. G.) 

 Corallum composite, forming hemispherical or sub-spherical 

 colonies. Corallites slender tubular, perforated as in Favosites and 

 with their outside striated by imperfectly developed costae. Radi- 

 ating septa (in the species at present known) about twenty-four. 

 Tabulse thin and apparently, in some instances, not complete. 

 When the corallites are not in contact, the space between them 

 is filled with a variously formed vesicular tissue. This genus re- 



