Hohnesdale Natural History Club. 17 



this suiEciently shows that further investigation is necessary. With regard 

 to light, that is direct or reflected rays, having any effect, I must express 

 myself a sceptic, having brought up from the egg many examples subject 

 tD starvation, repletion, and ordinary diet, under plain, green, white, 

 -yellow, orange, blue (of two tints), and crimson glass covers, without any 

 such appreciable difference in the colour of the insects as to be strictly 

 called a variety. 



Mr. H. B. Cox read a paper on " The Legs of Beetles," in which he 

 described in detail the structure and uses of the different parts, explaining 

 particularly the special adaptations found amongst the Dytiscidas and 

 Gyrinidie to enable tliem to perform their movements in and on the 

 water. 



Evening Meeting, March Hth, 1879. The President exhibited a 

 large implement of chert, from the valley of the Axe, where it had 

 been found among gravel, not chert. In connection with this, he referred 

 to the investigations being carried on by Mr. Worthington G. Smith 

 bj- the aid of the microscope into the substances that may occasionally be 

 found by careful search in the earth in which flint implements are met 

 with, at such a depth as to preclude the possibility of their having been 

 deposited there during any recent disturbance of the ground. Among 

 these he mentioned human hairs, as well as the hairs of bat, rat, mouse, 

 and other animals, some of which have not yet been identified. 



Mr. W. Gilford gave an address on the subject of '' The Geology of this 

 district, especially in reference to the question of the Water Supply." He 

 illustrated his subject by large geological maps including the greater part 

 of Surrey, Susses, and Kent, and a portion of Hampshire. He gave first a 

 general explanation of the formations occurring in these counties, com- 

 mencing with the chalk and descending to the Hastings sand, of which he 

 enumerated the various strata, comjDrising the Tunbridge Wells sand 

 Grinstead claj', Wadhurst cL\r, Ashdowu beds (which crop out in Asbdown 

 Forest, Susses, and consist mostly of very poor soil), and lowest the Ash- 

 barnham beds. It was in this series that the Wealden boring was commenced 

 in the espectation of coming to some of the primary rocks; it was 

 continued through the Purbeck and Portland beds and the Kimmeridge clay 

 to a depth of 2000ft. The explorers, however, failed to reach any of the 

 old rocks, but found beds of gj'psum, which have since been worked. The 

 Hastings sands appear to dip northwards as far as Sanderstead, near 

 Croydon, and the Weald clay about as far as Addiscombe. The lower 

 greensand was found in the boring at Meux's Brewery in Tottenham Court 

 Eoad, but was missing at Kentish Town, where the Devonian rocks were 

 met with. These were also found underlying the lower greensand at Meux's 

 Brewery, their age being determined by a fossil which was pronounced 

 certainly to belong to the Devonian series. Some geologists believe that the 

 Devonian rocks extend from under the coal measures in Belgium through 

 to the South Wales coalfields. The recent borings at Meux's Brerery, 



