Scientific Intelligence—Geology. 179 
clay, which has replaced the soft parts of the fish, and as they belong 
chiefly to the cyecloid and ctenoid orders, with soft scales, which are 
generally of small size, and easily detached and broken, the erania are 
the only portions usually preserved entire. In the classes of reptiles or 
mammalia, the peculiarities presented by the cranium point out, with 
certainty, the relations of the animal to which it belonged; but nothing 
is so variable as the shape of the bones which make up the skeleton of 
a fish’s head, and the multitude of processes and depressions serving 
for the attachment of muscles, gives to this part such a diversity, that the 
ichthyologist must often despair of being able to refer these fossil crania 
to their proper types; especially as they are often incomplete, wanting 
the jaws, the bones of the face, and the opereular and branchial apparatus, 
leaving only the bony inclosure of the brain. The author gives a de- 
tailed anatomical description of the various families. He then insti- 
tutes a comparison between the species found at Sheppy, and those 
now existing on the English coast, and concludes, that although 
their general character is somewhat different, yet their distribution has 
taken place according to the same laws. The forty-four species of fish, 
whose osseous remains are found at Sheppy, are referred to thirty-seven 
genera, nearly all of them unknown in the present seas ; and, excepting the 
gadoids, or cod tribe, their recent representatives are mostly confined to 
southern seas. The important evidence to be derived from a compari- 
son of the scales of these species with those of existing list:, remains to 
be obtained, and is attended with difficulty, as it requires the aid of the 
microscope.—Athenwum, No. 886, p. 956. 
5. On the Toadstone or Amygdaloid of Derbyshire. By J. Alsop.— 
Mr Alsop, at the York meeting of the British Association, observed, that 
many mining operations had been recently made in Derbyshire, with the 
view of finding a continuation of the veins beneath the beds of toad- 
stone,—experiments which are yery difficult, owing to the thickness of 
the toadstone, and uncertain in their results, on account of the varying 
character and productiveness of the strata and veins. In the section of: 
Crich Cliff, a bed of clay, about a foot thick, becomes, within a short dis- 
tance, fourteen fathoms thick, and contains large and hard nodules of 
'toadstone ; and the thick bed of toadstone sunk through at one shaft, 
diminishes to a foot or two in thickness at the other. In the Worksworth 
district, the “ Great clay,” containing blocks of toadstone, is clearly prov- 
ed to be the same as that at Crich, by the three beds of clay below each ; 
of these, the first, or “twenty fathom” clay, is unproductive; the second, 
or “ bearing clay,” is seventeen fathoms lower ; and the third clay, which 
is five fathoms lower still, is remarkably undulating. These “ three 
clays” are also recognisable at the Snitterton mines ; but here, what was 
a thin bed of clay at Crich and Worksworth, becomes a bed of toadstone 
about twelve fathoms thick, The second toadstone at Snitterton is simi- 
lar to the one at Crich and the great clay at Worksworth, and the lime- 
stone resting upon it is similar in its character; there is also, appa- 
rently, another toadstone bearing the same relation to the second as the 
twenty fathom clay at the other places; it is seen at the section of Bon- 
sall, where the three clays, and two beds of toadstone beneath them, are 
well known.—Athenwum, No. 887, p. 976. 
6. Our supposed inexhaustible Stores of Coal.—The opinion, that 
our stores of coal are all but inexhaustible, rests wholly on assumed data, 
