NOTES AND EXHIBITS. 



The Chairman exhibited specimens of the Tasmanite shale 

 'from the Mersey district. The volatile part of the shale was of 

 purely vegetable origin, and derived from the spore cases of 

 ancient club mosses, which were embedded in clay or sand. 

 These shales formed part of the [Mersey coal measure series, 

 but their exact relationship to the [Mersey coal seams was not 

 ■quite clear. 



Air. Lea exhibited a specimen of a legless lizard of the 

 genus Lialis, which looked remarkably like a snake, and two 

 geckos, which he obtained in New South Wales. 



[Mr. R. Hall. Curator of the [[\Iuseum, exhibited a specimen 

 of the wombat, from Flinders Island. It was one of four 

 specimens which were in Museums. Though originally found 

 in .all the islands of Bass Straits, it was now exterminated every- 

 where except on Flinders Island. It was a smaller species than 

 of the mainland. 



THE FOLLOWING PAPERS WERE READ. 



I. Notes on the Norman Vocabulary. By Hermann B. Ritz, 

 ALA. 



The author remarks that this document is of great value, as 

 containing what is probably the only vocabulary now extant in 

 the original manuscript, and a number of incidental notes 

 written by the same hand, these notes being very interesting in 

 themselves, and specially so because they do not seem to have 

 been incorporated in any of the published accounts of tlie cus- 

 toms of the aborigines of Tasmania. 



Dr. Noetling said that the paper upon which the manuscript 

 was written was hand-made, and bore the name of the manu- 

 facturer, and the date 1827. The information given by the Rev. 

 Jas. Norman was very interesting, but parts of it should be 

 taken wth some criticism. 



The Chairman said that ihe Rev. Jas. Norman arrived ia 

 Tasmania in 1827, and had been appointed to the charge of 

 .Sorcll in 1S32. He remembered [Mr. Norman himself, having 

 met him on the occasion of his first visit to Sorell, in 1864. 



[Mr. W. E. Shoobridge said that he remembered the Rev. 

 Jas. Norman, and knew that he took a great interest in the 

 -natives and their customs. Anything that he wrote on the 

 subject would have been written from his own observations. 



2. Notes on Eucalyptus Risdoni. By L. Rodway. 



[VIr. Rodway describes in detail the differences between that 

 species and Eucalyptus amygdalina, the ordinary peppermint 

 gum. The diameter ot the fruit was the safest test as to the two 

 species, but in E. risdoni there was a bluish bloom on the 

 leaves, which was absent in E. amygdalina. In E. risdoni, how- 

 ever, there was an excessive variability, produced by varying 

 surrounding conditions. 



