497 
ture, there occur abundant remains of small roots of trees converted 
to carbonate of lime, in which few traces of structure have been 
preserved. I have occasionally seen similar remains of roots, in a. 
state of lac lune, in loose caleareous sand, and gravel-beds in En- 
gland, e.g. in the coralline gravel of the lower greensand formation 
at Coxwell, near Faringdon, and in a diluvial sand and gravel-pit 
near Claydon in Buckinghamshire. _ 
We have, from Mr. W. Hamilton, a notice of the existence of vol- 
canic formations near the Bay of Fouges (the ancient Phocea), on 
the N. extremity of the Gulf of Smyrna, principally trachyte, passing 
downwards into pumiceous sandy rock, and traversed by trap dykes 
which have altered the adjacent rocks into imperfect jasper. At Ritri 
also, on the Bay of Erythrz, opposite Scio, he found trachyte asso- 
ciated with limestone and sandstone older than the trachyte, the 
limestone being sometimes vertical; near the Acropolis he found 
vertical strata of indurated shale and jasper, and calcareous beds 
much. shattered... On low hills near the shore, and on which the 
ruins of Halicarnassus stand, Mr. Hamilton has also found beds of 
voleanic sand and trachytic conglomerate; and from Boodrcom, six 
miles S.W., to the hill of Chifoot-kaleh, trachyte, or trachytie con- 
glomerates ; he found trachyte also on the promontory of Kara- 
baghla. 
SUBSIDENCE OF THE LAND AT PUZZUOLI. 
In a letter on the subsidence of the coast near Puzzuoli, Mr. Hul- 
mandel has shown cause to believe that a gradual subsidence of the 
soil has been going on for many years, from the fact communicated 
to him by the oldest friar (aged 93) in the Capuchin Convent at 
the entrance of Puzzuoli, that the road towards Naples, which 
when he was young passed between the Convent and the sea, has 
been obliged to be changed in consequence of the gradual subsiding 
of the soil. In 1813, the refectory and entrance-gate were from six 
to twelve inches under water when the wind blew strongly from 
the west; such submersions were unknown thirty years ago. 
ROCKS OF RECENT ELEVATION. 
We have from Captain Lloyd an account of an enormous coral 
reef, almost entirely surrounding the voleanie island of Mauritius ; 
near the Riviere de ‘Galets the sea has worn a barrier of coral 
from five to fifteen feet high, into most fantastic shapes; and at a 
considerable distance in the interior of the island, there occur two 
headlands of coral twenty-five feet above the level of the sea, which 
present the same marks of abrasion as the reef now exposed to the 
waves. 
The observatory stands on a bed of hard coral ten feet above 
high-water mark, and at several places in the interior of the island 
are large blocks of coral surrounded with the debris of marine 
shells and broken corals. These phenomena seem explicable only 
on the theory of a recent elevation of those parts of the wee on 
which these coral reefs occur. 
