534 Meeting of the British Association. [ Oct., 
syenitic mass, so distinct and gradual as to induce the belief that 
that mass is throughout no other than altered Cambrian; and that 
the Menevian is the great fossiliferous group, containing more than 
4() species, including 3 species of Paradoaides, which are never 
found together. 
Mr. Nicholson, in his paper “ On Fossils from the Graptolite 
Shales of Dumfriesshire,” stated that in the shales near Moffat, long 
known to yield graptolites, he had detected numerous bodies which, 
in their most perfect condition, were bell-shaped, averaged three- 
tenths of an inch in length and two-tenths in breadth, and were 
provided at one extremity with a prominent spire, the other ter- 
minating in a nearly straight or gently curved outline, and presenting, 
somewhere within their margin, an elevated poimt surrounded by 
several concentric ridges disposed with more or less regularity. In 
most cases the bodies were free and independent, but they occasion- 
ally occurred in such close juxtaposition to Graptolites Sedgwickit 
as to justify the belief that they were ovarian vesicles, at first 
attached to the parent stem, but finally becoming swimming zooids. 
If this conjecture were correct, the Graptolitidz would have to be 
referred to the Hydrozoa, and would find their nearest living ana- 
logues in the Sertularide. 
In a paper “ On a peculiar Denudation of a Coal Seam in Coate’s 
Park Colliery,” Mr. Oakes expressed the opinion that the observed 
phenomena distinctly proved the existence of an ancient, gigantic, 
rapid river, the bed of which is now 160 yards below the surface. 
As might have been anticipated, Sir R.'I. Murchison’s paper, 
“On the Various Tracts of England and Wales in which no Pro- 
ductive Beds of Coal can reasonably be looked for,” attracted a very 
large audience. The author, having described so much of the geo- 
logy of Britain and France as bore on his subject, and having 
poimted out the bearings of the facts which he brought forward, 
thus concluded his discourse: “By excluding from the inquiry 
into the present or probable future coal supply of England and 
Wales all the tracts of crystalline and Paleozoic rocks which rise 
out from beneath the carboniferous strata, and in which no trace of 
coal can ever be discovered, and also all those secondary and tertiary 
rocks beneath which it is hopeless to look for coal, it will be seen 
that the existing and possibly future supplies have, for all practical 
purposes, an approximately defined limit, and that they range over 
little more than one-eighth of England and Wales, or an area of 
about 6,000 square miles. I fully appreciate the anxious desire 
which is felt by all those persons who are interested in the future 
welfare of their country, to have the subject fully and fairly inquired 
into ; the more so as I have now, in conclusion, to announce that by 
the last inquiry made by Mr. Robert Hunt, the last year’s con- 
