426 TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION C. 



of country. This circumstance, if general over the coalfield, would seem to 

 demand some revision of current views respecting the origin and structure of 

 tlie Pennine Chain.' 



(2) The greatest structural division of the coalfield ' basin ' is by the equiva- 

 lent of a N.E.-S.W. anticline of which the southern limb is along the line 

 of the Don faults from Sheffield by Rotherham and Conisborough to Don- 

 caster. North of this line there is some evidence for the existence of a 

 syncline with its axis central near Frickley. In ground from which the Per- 

 mian rocks have been denuded, the coal attains a depth exceeding 1,800 feet 

 below sea-level. The general line of this northern trough follows a N.W.- 

 S.E. trend from Wakefield to South Kirkby, whence, displaced perhaps by the 

 Don anticline, it bends somewhat eastward through Bulcroft. South of the Don 

 a wider trough, also trending N.W.-S.E. through Yorkshire Main Colliery 

 (Edlington and Bawtry), carries the Barnsley bed (at Rossington) below 

 2,600 feet. 



(3) The inclination of the Barnsley Bed is at its steepest near the outcrop, 

 and, after the manner of gentle folds, the measures flatten out when the centre 

 line of the syncline is approached. There is no evidence to suggest any 

 general eastward rise of the Barnsley Seam within the area plotted on the 

 map. (The eastern boimdary of the map is through Thorne and Retford.) 



(4) By the plotting of the contour lines on Bartholomew's layer-coloured half- 

 inch contour map the interdependence of underground structure and topo- 

 graphical relief in the area of the exposed coalfield has been well brought out. 

 Over the whole coalfield most of the ridges are of escarpment form and elongate 

 along the line of strike ; but from the map it becomes evident that, wherever 

 the strike of the Barnsley Bed shows a change of direction, there the escarp- 

 ment ridges are found upstanding above their average height, and this whether 

 they form the arches or lie in the troughs of the folds. 



From his experience of the application of the contour method to the study 

 of the tect'y/iics of the Barnsley Bed, the author suggests that the method is of 

 peculiar usefulness in coalfield work. He offers this preliminary account of 

 the results of his work in Yorkshire in the hope that workers on the western 

 side of the Pennines may take up the method and use it in the further investiga- 

 tion of the many and difficult problems of geological structure presented by 

 the 'Back-bone of England.' 



5. Sixth PiPporf on E.rcaiwtions among the Cambrian Eoclcs of Coviley, 

 Shropshire. By E. S. Cobeold. — See Eeports, p. 117. 



FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 10. 

 The following Papers and Reports were read : — 



1. On the Restoration of certain Fossils by Serial Sections. 

 By Professor W. J. Sollas, F.R.S. 



Examples of fossils reconstructed from serial sections were exhibited. They 

 include a graptolite, Prionograptus ; a primitive fish, Palccospondylus ; the 

 skull of a reptile from the Karoo, Dicynodon ; and the skull of another reptile, 



' These views were admirably expressed by Prof. E. Hull, who in advocat- 

 ing them in 1868 succinctly remarked (Q.J.G.S. 1869, p. 331) : 'Immediately 

 upon the close of the Carboniferous period the northern limits of the York- 

 shire and Lancashire coalfields were determined by the upheaval and demidation 

 of the beds along east and west lines, while the coalfields themselves remained 

 in their original continuity across the region now formed of the Pennine hills 

 from Skipton southwards, and that at the close of the Permian period these 

 coalfields were dissevered by the uprising of the area now formed of the 

 Pennine Range by lines of upheaval ranging from north to south.' 



