59 



County, N. Y., sent him by Mr. Emmons, in which the Chazy is 

 found resting on slate, conglomerate, and sandstone, referred to the 

 Taconic system. On Mr. Safford's geological map of Tennessee, he 

 showed the position of primordial trilobites in strata many thousand 

 feet thick, below the lower Silurian. 



He presented to the Society a pamphlet on the '-'■ Neocomien dans le 

 Jura" in which, about two years since, he had attempted to show 

 that the Neocomian strata of the Jura are the geological marine 

 equivalents of the AVealden of the southeast of England, and that 

 the Purbeck beds belong to the upper oolite. 



Professor Agassiz said that, years before, in his work on fossil 

 fishes, he had come to the conclusion, from the examination of fossil 

 fragments of fish, that the Purbeck beds should be classed with the 

 Jurassic. He objected to the use of the expression " j^rimordial 

 fauna," as it implies that there was only one fauna during the period 

 in question ; as there is no single fauna of the present epoch, neither 

 was there of the distant geological ages, and as there are now several 

 contemporary faunae, so were there several in past ages. In order to 

 avoid confusion of a combination of animals or a fauna within a 

 definite space of the earth with the time of a geological epoch, he 

 advocated dropping the term primordial fauna, and adopting one 

 signifying a period of time. It might do to say the primordial fauna 

 of Bohemia, of America, of Scandinavia, &c., but not primordial 

 fauna simply as a combination of animals without regard to extent of 

 geographical distribution. 



Mr. Marcou replied that at the time the name primordial fauna was 

 given by Barrande, that of Bohemia was supposed to be the only one. 

 It has been found in other countries since, and the name has been 

 retained as a convenient expression not likely, in his opinion, to mis- 

 lead any one in the way alluded to by Prof Agassiz, and not under- 

 stood as implying the existence of only one fauna at this ancient 

 epoch. He thought, however, a better name could be given, and 

 should be, whenever the so-called Taconic system should be definitely 

 settled in science. 



Dr. Bacon, in reference to the cocoanut pearl, of which he had 

 made the first chemical analysis, read a passage from the chemist 

 Fourcroy, written se\'enty years since, in which these concretions are 

 noted as occurring in the cocoanut. How the carbonic acid and hme 

 originated in the cocoanut, which does not normally contain either, 

 is still a puzzle to the chemist and the botanist. 



Dr. Winslow remarked that the milk of the young cocoanut, as he 

 had many times experienced, has a pungent, acid, and refreshing 

 taste, similar to that resulting from carbonic acid ; whether this was 

 present or not he was unable to say. 



