60 Report from the Botanical Section. 



a characteristic conglomerate of the oolite," as well as comminuted 

 fragments of existing shells. These facts seem also to favour this 

 hypothesis. 



The subject altogether is one involved in considerable darkness, and it 

 is perhaps vain to attempt any generalization upon it, till the local 

 geology has been far more accurately examined and determined. This 

 has not hitherto been attempted. A primary country is thought to pre- 

 sent a barren field, and is too often passed over as devoid of interest, 

 whilst it often happens, that from want of the proper sm-vey, most inter- 

 esting facts are overlooked. We may yet find in primitive Buchan, a 

 beautiful geologic sequence. We have granite and trap, and gneiss 

 with its accompanying slates, we know. We have limestone, and some 

 trace of the Old Red. We have also a report of a fossiliferous limestone, 

 and an alleged greensand and chalk. The surmises on these subjects 

 may become facts, and the investigation requisite to make them so, must 

 lead to new discoveries. But proved or disproved, much of interest to 

 the geologist, both scientific and economic, cannot fail to come to light in 

 the examination, and the labour which must be expended on the process 

 will not be thrown away. 



25<A Ajml, 1849. — Tfie President in the Cliair. 



Mr. Howard Bowser was admitted a member. Mr. Keddie gave in 

 the following 



Repcyii, frcm the Botanical Section. 



\%th Decemher, 1848. — Dr. Walker Arnott made some observations 

 on the position of the carpels in the bicarpellary orders. The usual mode 

 of ascertaining this is by inspecting the flowers in a growing state, and 

 observing whether the two carpels are superior and inferior, or right and 

 left with regard to the axis of the ^^a^ii, or with regard to the subtending 

 bracteas ; but from the peduncles and fedicds having often a tendency to 

 twist, this method may lead to innacurate results. Dr. Arnott then 

 referred to the spiral disposition of the leaves on the stem and branches, 

 and of the theoretical arrangement of the verticels of the flower ; and 

 showed that in all cases one of the sepals (when there were five^ was 

 either superior or inferior: when, therefore, the two carpels were also 

 superior and inferior, one must be placed opposite to the centre of a sepal, 

 the other between two sepals ; when, on the other hand, the carpels were 

 at right angles, or right and left, a line passing through them would cut 

 the sepal on the one side precisely as it did the one on the other. By 

 attending carefully to this, an isolated flower would be sufficient to enable 

 one to determine the position of its carpels with regard to the axis of 

 inflorescence. Dr. Arnott mentioned that at least one group, reputed to 

 have its carpels superior and inferior, has them in some genera the con- 

 trary way, so that the whole subject requires revision, before we can place 



