Nov. 15, 1877] 



NATURE 



47 



tion in favour of the amalgamation of the agricultural 

 department of the society and the Royal Agricultural 

 Society, under the title of the Royal Irish Agricultural 

 Society ; after some discussion the report was carried. 

 The following are the principal points involved in the 

 reorganisation : — 



In accordance with the agreement entered into with 

 the Government, the principal conditions of which are 

 embodied in the "Act for the Establishment in Dublin 

 of a Science and Art Museum and the Development of 

 the Library of the Royal Dublin Society into a National 

 Library," the property of the society in land, buildings, 

 and collections has passed into the possession of the 

 Government. The society will, in accordance with such 

 agreement, receive the sum of 10,000/., which will be in- 

 invested in such security as, subject to the approval of 

 the Treasury, may be selected ; it will continue to be 

 provided with the requisite accommodation in Leinster 

 House ; the members will have free access to the several 

 departments as heretofore, whilst the existing members, 

 as well as all those who shall be admitted before January i 

 next, will have the right to borrow books from the 

 National Library. In order to assist in the more com- 

 plete development of that part of the society's work 

 which is devoted to the promotion of science and the 

 useful arts, it has been arranged that all the scientific 

 serials and transactions of learned societies, as well as all 

 duplicates in the library, shall remain the property of the 

 society ; the Lecture Hall and Laboratory will be reserved 

 for its use ; and the collections in the Botanic Garden 

 and Museum of Natural History will be available as for- 

 merly for the illustration of papers read before the society. 

 The most important condition, however, for the success- 

 ful prosecution of the society's scientific work, pure as 

 well as applied, is that for five years the cost of printing 

 the scientific papers read before the society will be de- 

 frayed by the Government. Concessions equally favour- 

 able have been obtained for the agricultural department. 

 Thus in lieu of the premises around Leinster House, 

 which will be required for museum buildings, &c., the 

 Government has undertaken to provide accommodation 

 for agricultural shows elsewhere, and to reimburse the 

 society for any pecuniary loss it may sustain in conse- 

 quence of the change of site from the city to the suburbs. 

 In order to develop the scientific work of the society, and 

 thus secure to the fullest extent the great advantage of 

 having the scientific papers read before it, printed, the 

 Committee of Science have submitted a scheme for the 

 complete reorganisation of the department under their 

 superintendence. Thus, the meetings for the discussion, 

 of subjects connected with science pure and applied will 

 be held in these sections : — i. For the physical and ex- 

 perimental sciences. 2. For the natural science, includ- 

 ing geology and physical geography. 3. Science applied 

 to the useful arts and industries. The papers to be read 

 at these sectional meetings will be published in 8vo, as 

 the Scientific Proceedings, the more important to be 

 published in 410, under the title of " Transactions." In 

 order to consolidate and economise both work and time 

 other scientific bodies have been invited to associate 

 themselves with the work of the sections, the meetings 

 of which will be held simultaneously on the third Mon- 

 day of each month, an invitation to which the Royal 

 Geological Society and the Scientific Club have re- 

 sponded. A special committee is now engaged in con- 

 sidering the measures most advisable to adopt with regard 

 to the future of the society, so as to maintain it as an 

 object of attraction to the educated classes, and a pre- 

 liminary report has been presented to the council, in 

 which it is advised that in addition to the more complete 

 organisation of the scientific department steps should be 

 taken to render the reading-rooms more efficient, to 

 establish a lending library for the use of future as well as 

 present members, to arrange for the delivery of lectures 



for the elucidation of the latest discoveries in science, 

 and to hold occasional conversaziones. According to 

 one of the conditions contained in Lord Sandon's letter 

 of February 9, 1876, the National Library will be placed 

 under the superintendence of a council of twelve trustees, 

 eight of whom are to be nominated by the Royal Dublin 

 Society and four by the Government. 



Then followed the Report of the Committees of the 

 Royal Dublin Society and of the Royal Agricultural 

 Society on the subject of amalgamation, which, as we 

 have said, was adopted. The two societies will to some 

 extent remain connected ; the Agricultural Society, Lord 

 Powerscourt stated, would be a branch of the Royal 

 Society, though under different management. 



aV THE EOCENE FLORA OF BOURNEMOUTH 



DURING this last summer and autumn I have seized 

 several opportunities of continuing my examination 

 of the Bagshot Beds of Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, 

 some of the results of which I think may interest your 

 readers. This series is, as is now well known, of great 

 importance from the fact of its being almost the only 

 series from the tertiaries whose absolute relative geological 

 age is positively known, it being under and overlapped on 

 the mainland by the London clay and Bracklesham beds 

 respectively, whilst in the Isle of Wight, occurring in a 

 complete series of eocene strata, upheaved vertically, its 

 true position is even still more plainly seen. It is further 

 important as exhibiting in gradual sequence the change 

 from an upland to a swamp flora, and represents very 

 fairly the local flora of a long period and of an entire 

 continent that has passed away. Of the richness and com-, 

 pleteness of the flora an idea may be formed from the fact 

 that I can reckon in my own collection not less than 10,000 

 selected specimens, many of large size, exclusive of twice 

 that number which I have discarded, whilst there are also 

 local collections at Bournemouth, a splendid series in the 

 Cambridge Museurn, and a scarcely less important one 

 from Alum Bay, at the British Museum. But perhaps 

 the most valuable discovery — to the botanist, at all 

 events — is that of various beds containing well-preserved 

 fruits above the horizon of the leaf-patches, identifiable 

 with fruits from Sheppey which are found in the London 

 clay, and therefore below the leaves. We thus appear to 

 have at Bournemouth the leaves of trees which may be 

 descended from those whose fruits are imbedded at 

 Sheppey. The assistance, it will be readily seen, of the 

 Sheppey fruits will be of the greatest value in deter- 

 mining the genera of the Bournemouth leaves and flowers. 

 At Bournemouth about sixteen kinds of fruit may be 

 collected in the seed-beds just mentioned, including 

 Nipadites, Hightea, Cucumites, and Petrophiloides, quite 

 sufficient to establish the fact that no break took place in 

 the succession of the London clay flora. 



The number of forms also common to Bovey Tracey 

 is worthy of note. The most abundant fern at either 

 locality is Pecopteris li^nitum (now believed to be an 

 Osmunda). Palmacites daemonorops of Heer, from Bovey, 

 is no other than the Cactus of which I have frequently 

 made mention. The dicotyledons of Bovey ascribed to 

 Laurus, Ficus, Daphnogene, Dryandroides, &c., appear 

 also to be identical with those of the Bagshots, and it is 

 therefore not at all improbable that the miocene age of 

 the Bovey Tracey beds, determined, as it seems to me, 

 on most slender grounds, will have to be reconsidered. 



The extremely local distribution of the leaves in patches, 

 each with its distinguishing group of plants, has again in 

 fresh instances come prominently under my notice. At 

 Studland, in one bed, fan palms with a three-foot radius 

 lie massed together, but in a decomposed state ; and I 

 only succeeded by using the utmost care in extracting 

 one specimen showing the full length of the leaf. At 



