444 
ter of the crag fauna might be due to the sea in which it lived opening 
to the north; and in support of this opinion he alludes.to the rapid tran- 
sition in the southern hemisphere from a district possessing a mild and 
equable climte, in which tropical forms of Testacea exist with others 
common to high latitudes, to one of extreme cold. Lastly, Mr. Lyell 
says, whatever speculations may be indulged, it is clear that the fos- 
sils of the crag and Faluns are almost entirely different from those of 
the London clay and Paris basin; that at least one-fifth of the fossil 
shells, both in the crag and Faluns, are identical with recent species ; 
that fifteen per cent. of the shells and corals of the Faluas are spe- 
cifically identical with those of the Suffolk crag; and that the sup- 
posed difference of climate indicated to the Testacea and Polyparia 
is by no means so great as some observers have supposed. Mr. Lyell 
nevertheless does not attach such importance to the per-centage of 
recent shells in the present state of knowledge of all the recent species, 
as to deduce from this source alone a positive inference regarding 
the precise agreement in age of the Faluns and the crag, merely 
stating that both deposits are referable to the Miocene epoch ; and as 
the red and coralline divisions of the Suffolk crag were not formed 
at the same time, so he conceives there may have been shades of dif- 
ference in the relative age of the Faluns and the crag. 
Ameng the donations of organic remains to the Museum announced 
at this Meeting were the following :— 
Crania, from the great oolite of the neighbourhood of Bath. Pre- 
sented by W. Walton, Esq. 
Pleurotomaria ornata (Defrance), Nautilus excavatus (Sow erby), 
Astarte Menardi? (Deshayes), from Burton, near Bridport. Pre- 
sented by E. H. Bunbury, Esq., Sec. G.S. 
Teeth of Otodus obliquus (Agassiz), from the London clay, Wal- 
ton, Essex. Presented by W. Taylor, Esq., of Blakeney, Norfolk. 
Sigillaria Knorrii (Ad. Brongniart), Clee Hill, Shropshire. | Pre- 
sented by Thomas Bottfield, Esq., F.G.S. 
Chetetes —, from the carboniferous limestone, Castle Espie 
Quarry, county Down. Presented by Capt. Jones, R.N., M.P., F.G.S. 
June 16.—The following papers were read :— 
1. “ Description of a Newer Pliocene Deposit at Stevenston, and 
of Post-Tertiary Deposits at Stevenston and Largs, in the County of 
Ayr,” by the.Rev. David Landsborough, and communicated by 
_ James Smith, Esq:, F.G.S. > 
The Newer Phocene Deposit.—This stratum was discovered in 1839 
in opening two coal-pits in the parish of Stevenston. After penetra- 
ting from thirty to thirty-five feet of sand, a bed of blue clay, nine 
feet thick, was passed through, and found to contain marine fossils 
of the newer Pliocene epoch. All the species have been obtained in 
other deposits of the same age in the basin of the Clyde, except two, 
— Astarte borealis, which occurs in a fossil state in the crag and living 
in the Arctic seas, and Astarte propinqua, a new shell. Mr. aude 
borough gives a list of the twenty-seven species collected by him, 
