230 Reports and Proceedings. 



stated that the cMef plants forming the Flora of the Coal formation, 

 were not found in the coal itself, but in the clay, called underclay, be- 

 neath it ; all organic structure havingbeen destroyed in the coal through 

 the subsequent changes which it has undergone. He enumerated the 

 different formations in which coal has been found, and then proceeded 

 to notice the most important plants of the true Coal-period. He ex- 

 plained their relations to living forms, illustrating his remarks by 

 dried specimens of the recent plants most nearty allied to those of 

 the coal. He referred to the many generic names that have been 

 given to different parts of both the Lepidodendron and Sigillaria be- 

 fore their structure was well determined, and stated that Mr. Binney 

 had even arrived at the conclusion that the two plants were the 

 same. He believed that the Flemingites, described by himself,^ was 

 the fruit of Sigillaria, as both were most abundant in the coal strata. 

 He concluded by briefly noticing some of the theories advanced to 

 account for the origin of coal. — H. B. W. 



Natubal History Society, Montreal. — ^I. — The usual monthly 

 meeting of this Society was held in their lecture-room on the evening 

 of the 18th December. — Dr. Small wood, the President, in the chair. 



Principal Dawson exhibited a number of specimens of flint imple- 

 ments and fossils from St. Acheul, near Amiens, and made some 

 observations on the mode of their occurrence in the "high-level 

 gravel," in the valley of the Somme. He referred to the investiga- 

 tions of Boucher de Perthes, LyeU, and Prestwich, and quoted a 

 portion of the description of the locality by the latter geologist. He 

 stated the following conclusions derived from an examination of the 

 locality and of the specimens, more especially those in the collection 

 of Mr. Prestwich : 



1. The implements cannot be considered so much as characteristic 

 of a particular age as of particular work. They are not spears nor 

 arrows, nor hatchets, but picks and diggers, adapted for digging in 

 the earth or ice, or for hollowing wooden canoes. A consideration 

 of the implements of the American stone age renders it in the highest 

 degree improbable that the makers of these tools did not possess also 

 stone arrows, spears, knives, and other implements. The application 

 of the idea of an older and ruder stone age to such implements is 

 gratuitous, and contradicted by American antiquities. 



2. There are some reasons to induce the belief that these imple- 

 ments have been used in driving small horizontal adits into the 

 gravel-beds of St. Acheul, in search of flints. In this case they may 

 not be of gTeat antiquity, though certainly older than the Eoman 

 occupation of Gaul. 



3. They may have been deposited with the gravel. In this case 

 they belong historically to a very ancient period, though geologically 

 modern ; and at the time when they were deposited the climate of 

 France must have been more severe than at present, its level different, 

 its surface covered with dense forests, inhabited by several great 



^ Geological Magazine, Vol. II. p. 433. 



