152 
An extract from a letter addressed to Dr. Andrew Smith by A. G. 
Bain, Esq., dated Graham Town, Cape of Good Hope, February 21st, 
1839, and communicated by Charles Darwin, Esq., was first read. 
The object of this extract is to announce the discovery, by Mr. 
Martin Smith, of the piths and portions of the head of an ox in the 
alluvial banks of the Modder, one of the tributaries of the Orange 
river, and 40 feet below the surface of the ground. ‘The piths with 
the breadth across the os frontis measured 11 feet 7 inches, but it is 
calculated that 5 inches had been broken off the end of each tip; and 
the circumference of the piths at the root was 18 inches. The 
orbits were situated immediately under the base of the horns. Part 
of the upper jaw, containing five molar teeth and other fragments of 
the head, as well as a cervical vertebra, were found at the same time. 
A paper “On the origin of the vegetation of our Coal-fields and 
Wealdens,” by J. T. Barber Beaumont, Esq., F.G.S., was next read. 
An examination of the fossil trees discovered on the line of the 
Manchester and Bolton Railway* has confirmed Mr. Beaumont in 
the opinion, that in no instance has the vegetation of the coal-fields 
arisen from drifted trees sunk to the bottom of mighty rivers and 
estuaries, but that it grew where it is found; and he is further of 
opinion, that the districts composing our present coal-fields were ori- 
ginally islands. 
The principal objections of the author to the theory of the trans- 
portation of the fossil vegetation are the following : 
1. The existence of a mighty river or estuary at the time of the 
deposition of the coal-measures, would require the existence of a vast 
continent of which there are no traces. 
2. The coal strata near Newcastle are 380 yards in thickness, and 
consequently, the lowest strata must have been deposited at the bot- 
tom of a river or estuary, exceeding in depth, six times the mean 
depth of the German Ocean. 
3. A continent producing such a river, it is reasonable to expect, 
would have left an abundance of fossils on its surface, as well as at 
the bottom of its great river; but all the land for hundreds of leagues 
around the coal and wealden formation swarms with the remains of — 
marine animals, and is clearly an ancient sea bed. 
4. In the coal-measures not a bone of a land quadruped is to be 
found, or a large timber tree, with the exception of a few Conifere. 
5. In order that the vegetation should have sunk to the bottom 
of a deep river, it must first have decayed ; but the plants preserved 
in the beds associated with the coal, present a freshness and perfec- 
tion incompatible with such a condition. 
6. Drifted trees are stopped in deltas only from the shallowness 
of the water being insufficient to float them on; we know of no de- 
posits of trees in deep water. 
The author then offers the followimg theory as affording a pre- 
ferable explanation of the origin of coal-fields and Wealden forma- 
tions. 
® See the Abstract of Mr. Hawkshaw’s Paper, ante, p. 139. 
