212 W. H. Hudleston— Recent Wells in Dorset. 



back of the froutals to the supraoccipital and interparietal, which are 

 greatly enlarged to resist the backward thrust. The shortening up of 

 the Cetacean brain seems to be in part due to this compression of the 

 skull and in part to the complete reduction of the olfactory region. 

 The shortening and, in some forms, the fusion of the cervical vertebrte 

 seem also to be a consequence of the same cause. The great size 

 of many of the Cetacea is no doubt rendered possible partly by 

 abundance of food and partly on account of the support of their weight 

 by the water. It is very notable that some of the earliest members 

 of the group, already in Middle Eocene times, attained very large 

 dimensions, but in this case, as usual, it does not appear that these 

 giants gave rise to any of the later stocks, which are derived from the 

 smaller and more plastic members of the group. 



jS^o doubt the various changes above noticed may be regarded as 

 entirely the result of selection acting on variations in the necessary 

 direction, but the rapidity with which these changes took place and 

 the apparent iiselessness of some of them, at least, suggest, that in 

 spite of generally accepted doctrine that acquired characters are not 

 inherited, in some cases complete change of the conditions acting 

 throughout the life of each individual for generations does actually 

 give rise to and direct the modifications undergone. 



Y. — Ojf SOME KECENT WeLLS IN DoRSET. 



(Paet I.) 

 By W. H. Hudleston, M.A., F.E.S., P.G.S. 

 rpHE requirements of towns, and even of camps, in the matter of 

 J_ water supply are so great nowadays that surface waters are 

 avoided as likely to be contaminated, and there is consequently 

 a great desire to rely on deeper sources. Quite an official literature 

 has sprung np of late years, and important memoirs have been issued 

 by the Geological Survey on the " imderground sources" of several 

 counties. So far as I am aware there has been no official memoir 

 relating to the county of Dorset, and this probably arises from the 

 circumstance that the artesian principle has not been made use of to 

 any great extent until recently, although the Dorset syncline would 

 seem to be eminently suitable for artesian wells, 



Nevertheless, some important sinkings and borings have been 

 executed in Dorset of late years, and these works, altogether ii're- 

 spective of their economic importance, as yielding abundant supplies 

 of good water, are of further interest to the geologist in that they 

 aiford evidence of the character and development of some of the 

 Tertiary strata, which cannot otherwise be obtained. The Bagshot 

 Beds of this county, for instance, have always presented difficulties 

 to the stratigraphist, since few reliable outcrops can be obtained in the 

 interior of the country on account of the yielding nature of the sands 

 and clays of this formation. It is for these reasons that I venture to 

 offer in the pages of the Geological Magazine an abstract of two 

 papers which have already appeared in the Proceedings of the Dorset 

 Field Club, the one relating chiefly to a deep but not artesian well, 

 sunk for the supply of the town of AVareham, and the other a paper 



