ON THE VOLCANIC PHENOMENA OF VESUVIUS. 229 



the temperature of the lava and, if possible, of its specific gravity at dif- 

 ferent temperatures. 



The reporter regrets to show less apparent work in the present report, 

 but he can assure the Section that not less real work has been carried 

 out. 



Third Rejport of the Committee, consisting of Dr. W. T. Blanford, 

 Professor J. W. Judd, Mr. W. Cakruthees, Dr. H. Woodward, 

 and Mr. J. S. Gtardnek, for the purpose of reporting on the 

 Fossil Plants of the Tertiary and Secondary Beas of the United 

 Kingdom. {Drawn up by the Secretary, Mr. J. S. Gtardnee.) 



The small balance carried forward from last meeting has been ex- 

 pended in visiting the localities in which fossil plants have previously 

 been met with. 



The beds near the pier at Bournemouth seem more than usually 

 inaccessible, but a fall from the clifE has brought down some of the dark 

 clays, and in these were parts of a lai'ge featlier palm and other leaves. 

 I was fortunate enough, however, to secure at the west end of the cliffs 

 a new species of Acer and a fine leaf of Bryandra acutiloba, really a Myrica, 

 a rare leaf at Bournemouth, and one of the few that extend upward from 

 the Lower Bagshot into the Bournemouth horizon. 



I have again visited Alum Bay, but the pipe-clay on the shore has 

 become still more diminisbed, and there is no hope that any more fossil 

 plant-remains will be obtained there in our time. No distinct plant- 

 remains are obtainable from the same horizon at WhitecliQ' Bay, though 

 I had some hope that this might be the case. The drought was unfavour- 

 able to collecting at Barton and Hordwell, where most interesting fruits 

 are washed out during heavy rains, and I procured no plants during my 

 visits there this year; but it favoured, on the contrary, collecting at 

 Lough Neagh, by lowering the level of the lake, and I am able to add a 

 new Pteris, an exquisitely preserved fruit, and many dicotyledons to the 

 flora, and a Paludina to the fauna. 



No plant-remains were obtainable this year at Reading, nor do any 

 of the other brick-pits in which plant-remains have occurred seem in 

 exactly a favourable state at the moment for collecting ; so that it appears 

 undesirable to ask for further grants for this purpose at present. The 

 Lower Eocene floras are, however, still insufficiently known, and excava- 

 tions at Bromley, or elsewhere in the Woolwich horizon, would, I anticipate, 

 yield especially important results. In the meantime an enormous mass 

 of material has now been accumulated, which will require years of patient 

 research to digest. Advantage has been taken of the presence of that 

 distinguished palseobotanist, the Marquis de Saporta, at our meeting to 

 go through the drawings, numbering more than a thousand, that I have 

 already made of the fossil plants so far collected. He is completely 

 astonished at the richness of our Eocenes, and considers them to be 

 unrivalled. The Reading and Bournemouth horizons contain plants 

 which do not appear in Europe until much later Tertiary times, seeming 

 to have passed very slowly across Europe towards Eastern Asia — which 

 may be considered their present home — their chief affinities being with 

 floras indigenous to that part of the globe, rather than with those of 

 America and Australia, as hitherto supposed. 



