72 report — 1877. 



Note on the Fossil Flora of the Arctic Regions. By Professor Heer. 



The Post-Tertiary Fossils procured in tlie late Arctic Expedition ; ivith Notes 

 on some of the Recent or Living Mollusca from the same Expedition. By 

 J. Gwyn Jeffreys, LL.D., F.R.S, 



The fossils were collected by Captain Feilden and Mr. Hart, the Naturalists of tlie 

 Expedition, and by Lieut. Egerton and Dr. Moss, two of the officers of H.M.S. 

 ' Alert,' in very high latitudes, viz. between 82° and 83° N. long. The furthest point 

 reached by the Expedition was 83° 20' 26". These fossils were found in mud- 

 banks or raised sea-beds, at heights ranging from the level of the sea to 400 feet above 

 it. They consisted of 18 species of Mollusca, 1 of Hydrozoa, 1 of Forarninifera, and 1 

 of marine plants, being altogether 21 species, all of which now live in the Arctic 

 Seas. The author gave a list of the species, and showed their distribution in a recent 

 or living as well as fossil state ; and he added some remarks as to the recent Mollusca 

 procured in the Expedition, and as to the apparent abundance of marine animals in 

 the " Palseocrystic Sea " of Sir George Nares. 



On the Occurrence of Pebbles in Carboniferous Shale in Westmoreland. 

 By G. A. Lebour, F.G.S. 



This paper was a note of the occurrence of rounded and subangular pebbles of 

 quartz or quartzite (which were exhibited) in a bed of Carboniferous shale in Angill, 

 Westmoreland. The pebbles were all of the same character, and were probably 

 derived from some of the Lake-District rocks and not from veins. The author 

 brought the present note forward chiefly to elicit the opinions of members of the 

 Section as to the probable origin of the stones. The rocks associated with the shale 

 in question were briefly described. 



Notes on the Age of tlie Cheviot Rods. By G. A. Lebour, F.G.S. 



The great mass of the Cheviots consists essentially of porphyrites passing into 

 granite and syenite, of ashes, and of doleritic rocks of varied character. Wherever 

 Silurian rocks are seen in contact with this mass they are tilted up and disturbed 

 by it. Wherever, on the other hand, unfaulted junctions of Carboniferous beds 

 (including the so-called Upper Old lied, or Basement beds) with Cheviot Traps arc 

 seen, the former rest undisturbed upon tlie latter. Moreover, the basement beds 

 are largely composed of fragments of Cheviot porphyrite, &c, and these extend 

 upwards into the Tuedian or Calciferous Sandstone Series. Tlie Cheviot rocks as a 

 whole, then, are post-Silurian and pre-Carboniferous, probably of Devonian age. 

 This is well attested if not a very generally known fact. Two sets of rocks, how- 

 ever, of minor importance in the mass appear to bear witness to at least one, and 

 probably two, later dates in the history of the range. These are, first, certain 

 vesicular dolerites which occur chiefly in the southern portion of the English side 

 of the Cheviots, and which form bosses among the porphyrites, and appear to be 

 quite distinct from the more compact dolerites which seem to pass gradually into 

 the latter. The vesicular dolerites are, in fact, intrusive in the porphyrite and in 

 the compact dolerites. This fact alone would give no clue to their age. This clue 

 is afforded by bosses of this vesicular dolerite piercing through the older Car- 

 boniferous rocks immediately to the south of the Cheviot mass near the head of 

 the Dedewater, in Northumberland, a mile or two from the Scottish border. Rock 

 of this character is seen nowhere else in the district. It seems fair, therefore, to 

 assume that the vesicular dolerites are at least of Tuedian age. In this they pro- 

 bably agree with a mass of intrusive porphyry which crosses the valley of the 

 Tweed near Corham, but which the author has not studied. 



