HAMILTON SCIENTIFIC ASSOCIATION 143 



richest centres ever discovered for middle Silurian organisms 

 on this American continent, when the writer expressed the 

 opinion published in the proceedings of the Hamilton Scien- 

 tific Association that no country as far as he could see, could 

 ever hope to compete with Ontario in certain classes of Sil- 

 urian fossils, he emphatically declares it v^^as no idle boast 

 put forth on behalf of the section. He knew he possessed 

 then a very extensive collection of Graptolites, Sp07iges, Bryo- 

 zoons, retained in his own possession until such time as ad- 

 ditional room might be furnished and a few more cases pro- 

 vided. However much the President and members of the 

 Section may regret their transference to other places where 

 such things are appreciated, tlie loss is that of Hamilton it- 

 self, and not to our Section of the Association, since a wider 

 field is open to investigation by many who little expected to 

 find in an almost unknown locality, Silurian Sedimentary 

 deposits far richer than the closest investigation revealed to 

 the many trained professionals in Europe. Is not this cir- 

 cumstance no slight compensation to this Geological Section ? 

 It seems quite unnecessary to call attention to the numerous 

 communications received regarding the extinct living 

 creatures and plants, which lived and flourished in the old 

 seas ; millions of years before man himself appeared or even 

 the uplifted sea beds, the rich vegetation which produced the 

 coal measures of the after time. 



The City Quarry, lately acquired at the head of what is 

 known as " The Strongman Road," presenting mere -surface 

 soil with no glacial clay, acting as a preservative to the 

 organic remains underneath assuredly lead to the conclusion 

 that we had there fossiliferous beds, if such ever existed ; that 

 water penetrating from above utterly destroyed such organ- 

 isms in the weathered layers themselves perhaps may be ac- 

 cepted. Yet I hardly think that a sufficient reason for finding 

 so very few fossils where their existance was expected, while 

 the writer suggested this may be owing to the deposit of a 

 larger amount of mineral matter, earthy manganese oxide, 

 which undoubtedly is found there in greater quantities than 



