Ml. 42.] TERTIARY MEMOIRS. 95 



ing that the now prevalent forms of foliage amongst 

 Dicotyledonous plants did not predominate before the 

 glacial epoch, posterior to which all the existing 

 British plants, except the alpines, were introduced 

 into our island, as has been shown by Professor E. 

 Forbes in his Essay on the Flora and Fauna of the 

 British Islands." 1 The paper following it is a short 

 one, " On some Swallow Holes on the Chalk Hills 

 near Canterbury." That which succeeds it is " On 

 the Thickness of the London Clay ; on the Relative 

 Position of the Fossiliferous Beds of Sheppey, High- 

 gate, Harwich, Newnham, Bognor, &c. ; and on the 

 Probable Occurrence of the Bagshot Sands in the 

 Isle of Sheppey." The memoir immediately next to 

 the preceding, and which treats of the same geological 

 formations from the palaepntological side, is entitled, 

 " On the Distinctive Physical and Palseontological 

 Features of the London Clay and Bracklesham Sands ; 

 and on the Independence of these two Groups of 

 Strata." 



Of these Eocene memoirs, Edward Forbes wrote 

 and he was no mean judge : " These remarkable essays 

 embody the result of many years' careful observation, 

 and are unexcelled for completeness, minuteness, and 

 excellence of generalisation." 



It will be observed that in 1854 there was a great 

 amount of published work. It is true that all this 

 geological literature had been thought out and worked 

 at before, yet the amount of patient labour is " amaz- 

 ing," when it is remembered that his daily duties ab- 

 sorbed what are usually deemed the working hours of 

 the day. 



Besides the writings which were brought out by the 



1 Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., vol. x. p. 165, 1854. 



