420 Reports and Proceedings. 
Jonah upon the dry land. The apparently living acts ascribed 
to the fish are spoken of inanimate objects.’ How it can be 
said that a dead fish with its dorsal surface denuded could vomit, 
we cannot understand; and our readers must enjoy a greater power 
of deglutition than the whale itself if they can unravel this incom- 
prehensibility. 
In the above remarks, it has been our object to select such 
average passages as should give a notion of the scientific qualifications 
of the present writer to reconcile the two records of Scripture 
and Science. It is not for us here to offer any opinion whether 
or not such a reconciliation may be ultimately probable. But 
the present occasion is so unsuitable to discuss this grave question, 
that we must close this notice with the expression of our opinion 
that no one ought to attempt so hazardous an undertaking who 
is not thoroughly conversant with the facts and deductions of 
modern geology ; and the author’s quotation of the prayer of the 
penitent thief upon the cross, as his farewell word, appears to inti- 
mate his conviction that he had attempted and failed in a task 
beyond his power. 
REPORTS AND PROCEEDINGS. : 
—— 
EpinpurcH GroLocicaL Sociery.—On June 19th, the concluding 
Meeting for the session was held; Mr. David Page, F.G.S., F.R.S.E., 
Vice-president, in the chair. Mr. A. Beattie was elected a Member. 
Mr. New Srewart read a paper On Fossil Trees in Sandstone 
Beds; and the Manner of their Deposition and Preservation as Evi- 
dences of Quicksands in Geological Periods. He first described the 
main character of what are termed ‘ snags’ in the Mississippi as illus- 
trative of his subject; and then he gave a description of the fossil 
trees that have been found in Craigleith Quarry, near Edinburgh, 
and elsewhere. He showed that a general distribution of drifted 
plants had taken place over the whole area of the Carboniferous 
rocks, on different planes, and that some of those plants had come 
within the influence of petrifying fluids, which had preserved their 
structures, and that those fluids had permeated their structures by 
endosmose and exosmose. He stated that fossil trees had been depo- 
sited in a manner similar to that in which trees are in the course of 
being daily embedded in the sands of rivers, bays, &c., at the present 
time. He also stated that the microscope clearly shows that plants 
when found in an erect position, or nearly so, have not had their 
tissues flattened by compression. Mr. Stewart then described fossi- 
lization by means of petrifaction, and gave it as his opinion that the 
calciferous sandstones of the Carboniferous period formed the quick- 
sands of the ancient seas. 
Mr. Pace then delivered the concluding address to the Society as 
follows :—In closing the session on behalf of our venerable Presi- 
dent, who pleads the infirmities of age for the non-fulfilment of this 
