580 
and fauna. In the so-called Bryant cannel of 
England, M. Renault finds the Pila scotica, of 
Torbane Hill, with macrospores and affected 
with bacteria. Here occur filaments of a fungus 
which he calls Anthracomyces. The mycella in- 
vade the covering of the spores of the alge. 
They are very fine but distinct under a high 
power (1000/1), and susceptible of clear illus- 
tration. Other cannels of the Old World pres- 
ent substantially the same features. 
M. Renault has carefully studied the speci- 
mens of cannel coal sent him from America and 
the results are interesting. The specimens rep- 
resented many localities in West Virginia and 
Kentucky, and the names he gives are: Can- 
nelton and Davis Creek in West Virginia, and 
Beaver Dam (mentioned above), Little Laurel 
Creek, Natz Creek, Hunnewell, Georges Branch, 
Caney Creek, Blackwater Creek, Mercer Sta- 
tion, Magofin County and Buena Vista in 
Kentucky. Those of Beaver Dam and Little 
Laurel Creek he classes as bogheads, the rest 
he regards as true cannels. The Cannelton 
specimens are filled with spores of ferns and 
lycopods, the walls of which have Micrococci 
disseminated through them. Algz are rare in 
most of the American material except that of 
the boghead type, but in that from Davis Creek, 
classed as cannel, they occur, and belong to the 
above-mentioned genus Cladiscothallus. The 
species, however, is not the same as that of the 
Russian bogheads, and M. Renault has done me 
the honor toname it C. Wardi. It is discoid 
and spread outin a single plane with numerous 
dichotomous branches. It does not seem to be 
affected with bacteria. The specimens from 
Buena Vista, Kentucky, are wholly destitute of 
alge. 
In the coal basin of Commentry, in central 
France, which has yielded such a magnificent: 
flora and great numbers of insects, and which 
I had the pleasure of visiting in September last, 
there is at the Puits Forét a combustible min- 
eral substance substantially representing cannel 
coal. It has yielded to M. Renault’s micros- 
cope aconsiderable number of organized bodie, 
consisting of spores of ferns and Equisetacezs 
but no alge. He also finds the macrospore 
Of Sphenophyllum and pollen grains of gymno- 
sperms, wood of Cwlamodendron, and trans- 
SCIENCE. 
[N. 8. Vou. XIII. No. 328. 
verse sections of leaves, probably of Cordaites. 
Throughout the mass are every where distributed 
numerous Micrococci, on the surface of the 
membranes of the spores, and pollen grains, in 
the fragments of indeterminable vegetable mat- 
ter and in the general matrix. Similar condi- 
tions obtain in certain barren measures at Rive- 
de Gier in the basin of Sajnt-Etienne, Upper 
Loire. 
M. Renault treated many specimens of car- 
bonized wood from the coal measures of Zsily, 
Hungary, Bouble near Saint-Hloi (Puy-de- 
Déme) and Decazeville in France, and found 
them more or less permeated with bacteria 
(Micrococcus Carbo, Bacillus colletus, Cladothryx 
Marty). He also found filaments of saprophytic 
fungi. 
The coprolites and certain fish bones and scales 
of the bituminous schists of Autun, Igornay and 
Lally proved a rich field for the microscope, large 
numbers of Micrococci, bacilli and fungi (Mu- 
cedites, Anthracomycetes) from these sources be- 
ing illustrated in this work. 
A still richer source of fossil microorganisms 
is the various Paleozoic flints that occur in cer- 
tain coal basins and other deposits. It was 
from such that Brongniart described so many 
remarkable seeds and fruits of Carboniferous 
plants, chiefly from the basin of Saint-Etienne. 
They contain all manner of vegetable tissues, 
and M. Renault finds these permeated with 
bacteria and fungi. The silica has preserved 
everything with great exactness and the illus- 
trations of microscopic organisms in this matrix 
are much clearer than those from the fossil 
combustibles. Some of these are older than 
the coal measures and are found in the Culm 
and even in the Devonian, as those of the 
Cypridine schists of Saalsfeld, in which silici- 
fied remains of Cordaioxylon are affected by a 
Micrococcus (M. devonicus). At Estnost, near 
Autun, the roots of a species of Lepidodendron 
(Z. estnostense) have buried in their parenchy- 
matous tissue the eggs of an insect or arthro- 
pod, which has been named Arthroon Rochei. 
Further details cannot be given here, but 
this notice should not be concluded without 
calling attention to the geological and even 
economic value of the work. It goes far 
toward furnishing the solution of many of the 
