Reports & Proceedings — Geological Society of London. 43 



Though investigations of some earlier formations have shown that 

 there are extinct forms of Characese exhibiting important points of 

 difference from their living representatives, the remarkably distinct 

 and characteristic oogonium of five elongated spirally twisted cells 

 has remained constant certainly as far back as the Inferior Oolite, 

 and it is only in earlier formations that any doubt arises as to whether 

 bodies are or are not Chara fruits. 



Characese are found in still fresh or brackish water all over the 

 world, under widely different conditions as regai'ds heat, etc., and 

 may therefore be expected to occur in almost all freshwater forma- 

 tions. 



For these reasons it is suggested that the fruits of this group of 

 plants, when more widely collected, may prove of considerable value 

 as zonal fossils for the correlation of lacustrine deposits lying in 

 isolated basins. Doubtless, on account of their small size, the 

 Characese have in the past often been overlooked. 



2. December 6, 1916.— Dr. Alfred Harker, F.R.S., President, 

 in the Chair. 



Mr. Gr. C. Crick, A.R.S.M., F.G.S., gave an account of some 

 recent researches on the Belemnite animal. He stated that it was 

 not his intention to deal that evening with the homologies of the 

 Belemnite shell or with the phylogenyof the Belemnite group, but to 

 confine himself to the restoration of a typical Belemnite animal and 

 its shell, as shown particularly by examples in the British Museum 

 collection. 



He first demonstrated, by means of a rough model, the construction 

 of the Belemnite shell, including the guard or rostrum, the phragmo- 

 •cone with its ventrally situated siphuncle, and its thin envelope the 

 conotheca, with its forward prolongation and expansion (on the 

 dorsal side) known as the pro-ostracum. He then exhibited photo- 

 graphic slides of examples in the British Museum collection showing 

 these various characters, and noted the abrupt termination of the 

 chambered cone on the lower part of the pro-ostracum, of which the 

 dorsal surface may have been partly or almost completely covered 

 by a thin forward extension of the guard. To illustrate what was 

 known of the complete body of the animal as found associated with 

 the guard, he then showed photographic slides of two of the examples 

 figured by Huxley in his Memoir on the Structure of the Belemnitidce 

 published in 1864. Each of these exhibited the guard associated 

 with portions of the pro-ostracum, the ink-bag, and the hooklets of 

 the arms. The form of the hooklets with their thickened bases was 

 discussed, this feature in a great measure justifying the attribution 

 to the Belemnite of certain Cephalopod remains (found practically at 

 about the same geological horizon) that included uncinated arms 

 associated with an ink-bag, and frequently also with nacreous portions 

 of (presumably) the pro-ostracum. 



Of the remains of uncinated armed Cephalopods from the Lias, 

 each exhibiting the same form of hooklets as those figured by 



