Geological Society. 311 



GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



[Continued from p. 240.] 

 February 20, 1S56. — D. Sharpe, Esq., President, in the Chair. 

 The following communications were read : — 



1. "Notice of a Visit to the Dead Sea." By H. Poole, Esq. 

 Forwarded from the Foreign Office by order of Lord Clarendon. 



Mr. Poole went to this district to look for niti-e, which was re- 

 ported to occur there ; but he met with none, and found reason to 

 suppose that the report was unfounded. He noticed bituminous 

 shales at Nebi Mousa, and sulphurous earths both there and at El 

 Lisan on the Dead Sea, but the sulphur was not found in any large 

 quantity. The author exhibited to the meeting a series of these 

 deposits, and of rock-salt and other minerals from the neighbourhood 

 of the Dead Sea, together with recent natural history specimens, 

 volcanic and other rock-specimens, and some tertiary and cretaceous 

 fossils from the district visited. 



2. " On the Affinities of the great extinct Bird (Gasiornis parisi- 

 ensis, Hebert) from the lower Eocene near Paris." By Prof. Owen 

 F.R.S., F.G.S. 



Prof. Owen communicated the results of his comparisons of the 

 fossil tibia of the Gastornis parisiensis, Hebert, — a large bird from 

 the lower Eocene deposits at Meudon near Paris — with the tibia of 

 known recent and fossil birds. 



The tibia of the Gastornis presents the same median position of 

 the supra-tendinal bridge as in the Albatross and the lamellirostral 

 web-footed birds ; but, as the same position of the bridge occurs in 

 the Notornis, the Gallinule, the Raven, and some accipitrine birds, 

 that character is not conclusive of the affinities of the Gastornis to 

 the Palmipeds ; and it is further invalidated by a difference in the 

 aspect of the plane of the lower outlet of the bridge. In the Alba- 

 tross (Diomedcea) and the Lamellirostres, the foramen or outlet looks 

 directly forwards ; its plane is vertical. In the oblique aspect of 

 that outlet, the Gastornis more resembles the large Waders (Gra/lee) 

 and the Dinornis tribe. Amongst the Gallinacea, the Turkey (il/e- 

 leagris) nearly resembles the Gastornis in the position of the bridge ; 

 and more nearly resembles it than does the Albatross or the Swan in 

 the low tuberosity external to the bridge above the base of the outer 

 condyle, as well as in the shallow groove dividing that tuberosity 

 from the bridge. The depression on the fore-part of the tibia above 

 the distal condyles, if natural to the Gastornis, is a structure not 

 preci.scly repeated in any of the Gralla:. In the Ciconia Argala the 

 anterior interspace of the condyles forms a cavity, bounded above by 

 the tubercle and ridge developed from the bridge, and by the oblique 

 converging u])])er borders of the condyles below. The canal of the 

 bridge opens below into the concavity. In the Grvs Antigo?ie the 

 lower border of the outlet of the bridge defines, with a tubercle ex- 

 ternal to it, the shallow sujjracondyloid cavity; but there is no 

 definite fossa, like tiiat in the Gastornis. 



In tlie Notornis, the breadth of the lower end of the tibia a little 



