Reports and Proceedings — Scientific Society, Reading. 37 



the pallial lobes, the intestine, the nerves, and the atrial system 

 afford characters amply sufficient to define the class. The greatest 

 depth at which a living species has been found alive has been 2990 

 fathoms. As to classification, he groups the recent species into two 

 great divisions : I. Anlhropomata (Owen)= Ctistenterata, (King); II. 

 Lypomata (Owen) = Tretenterata (King). The Anthropomata he 

 divides into three families : — (1), Terebratulacea, with seven sub- 

 families and thirteen genera and subgenera, seventy species, and 

 twenty-one uncertain species; (2), Thecideidce, with one genus and 

 two species ; (3), Rhynchonellidce, one genus, one subgenus, and eight 

 species. The Lypomata he also divides into three families, five 

 genera and subgenera, twenty-three species, and seven uncertain 

 species : — (1), Craniidce, with one genus and four species ; (2), 

 Discinidce, with one genus, one subgenus, and eight species ; (3), 

 Lingididce, with one genus, one subgenus, and eleven species. Be 

 does not accept M. Deslongchamps' scheme (1884) of classifying 

 the Terebratulina, bring;in<>; forward Mr. Dall's observations on 

 Waldheimia floridana of delicate spicules in the floor of the great 

 sinuses as telling evidence against the arrangement. The various 

 genera and species are then dealt with, followed by remarks on the 

 Terebratulaceoe, with copious descriptions and observations. 



II. — Reading Literary and Scientific Society, Oct. 13, 1885. 



"On the Coal-fields of the United Kingdom." Inaugural 

 Address from the President, J. H. Blake, F.G.S.. Associate 

 Mining Institute C.E., of EL M. Geological Survey of England. 

 The President remarked that the question as to the rapid exhaustion 

 or otherwise of our coal-fields was of national interest and importance. 

 Coal consists of indurated or mineralized vegetable matter, and 

 occurs in seams, interstratified in beds of sandstone, grit, shale, clay, 

 and ironstone, and more rarely of limestone. These together are 

 called the Coal-measures, which in some Coal-fields attain a thick- 

 ness of some thousand feet. Of the amount of vegetation required 

 to form not only one seam but forty or fifty or more, varying from 

 one inch to several feet in thickness, which often succeed each other 

 in Coal-fields, we can form no adequate conception, any more than 

 we can calculate the time required for their growth and consolidation. 

 Passing more or less through the stage of peat, each bed or mass of 

 vegetation got buried under successive sediments, and through the 

 influence of time, water, chemical changes and pressure eventually 

 became converted into coal. In Britain and elsewhere the Carbon- 

 iferous rocks, which were originally more or less horizontal, were 

 disturbed and thrown into a series of wave-like curves or contortions 

 together with other formations of older date. After this disturbance, 

 combined with faults or dislocations of the beds, denudation or waste 

 ensued, and the upper part of the curves being most exposed were in 

 many instances removed or worn away, the portion so removed 

 supplying material for newer strata. The lower part of the curves, 

 or basin-shaped portions, were preserved from destruction by their 



