126 British Association for the Advancement of Science. 



Mr. Strickland mentioned the discovery of an Ichthyosaurus, 

 at Strensham near Tewkesbury, by Mr. Marrett, and also exhib- 

 ited a fossil fish with cycloidal scales from the lias, a fact not 

 agreeing with the hypothesis of Agassiz. 



Dr. Wilde made a communication on ancient Tyre, and gave 

 many interesting statements concerning the celebrated Tyrian 

 dye. 



Mr. Bowman read a paper on some skeletons of fossil vegetables, 

 found by Mr. Binney, in the shape of a white impalpable powder, 

 under a peat-bog near Gainsborough, occupying a stratum four to 

 six inches in thickness, and covering an area of several acres. It 

 appeared to be pure silica. On examination with high magnifiers, 

 the powder was found to consist of a mass of transparent squares 

 and parallelograms of different relative proportions, whose edges 

 were perfectly sharp and smooth, and often traced with delicate 

 parallel lines. On comparing these with the forms of some ex- 

 isting Confervas, Mr. B. found the resemblance so strong, that he 

 had no doubt they were the fragments of parasitical plants of that 

 order, either identical with, or nearly allied to, the tribe Diato- 

 macecB v/hich grow abundantly on the other Algae. 



Mr. Murchison exhibited a geological map of Europe, colored 

 by Yon Dechen, and the first part of a work on Petrifactions, col- 

 lected by Humboldt in South America. The latter work has led 

 to some important conclusions ; — no oolitic or Jurassic strata seem 

 to exist in South America (or perhaps even in North America ;) 

 but there is a large development of the tertiary series, and a still 

 larger of cretaceous, in the southern continent. Specimens of 

 Silurian fossils had been brought to the present meeting of the 

 Association, collected in North America, by Prof. C. U. Shepard 

 of New Haven, Ct. 



Mr. Murchison called the attention of the meeting to a section 

 of a part of Germany which he had lately visited. Mr. Murchi- 

 son stated, that having with Prof Sedgwick, examined the older 

 rocks of Western Germany and Belgium, it is their intention to lay 

 before the Geological Society of London, a memoir, illustrated by 

 fossils, on the classification of those ancient deposits, a succession 

 of the Carboniferous, Devonian and Silurian systems. His pres- 

 ent communication bore only on one point of this analysis, offer- 

 ing to prove the geological position of the anthracite or culm- 

 bearing strata of Devonshire and Cornwall. 



