﻿330 Reports and Proceedings: — 



Count Gaston de Saporta, F.C.G.S., expressing the hope that Fellows 

 of the Society would attend the meeting of the French Association 

 for the Advancement of Science, which will be held in August next 

 in Havre. Count de Saporta stated that any Fellows attending the 

 Meeting will be exceedinglj'' welcome, and that any who will send 

 word previously of their intention to come will meet with a most 

 cordial reception. In connexion with this it was further announced 

 that, according to a circular from the Geological Society of Normandy, 

 that Society proposes, during the meeting of the Association, to hold 

 a Geological Exposition, intended as preliminary to that to be held 

 in Paris next year, and that it invites co-operation. 

 The following communications were read ; — 



1. "Remarks on the Coal-bearing Deposits near Erekli, the 

 ancient Heraclea, Pontus-Bithynia." By Eear-Admiral T. A. B. 

 Spratt, C.B., F.E.S., F.G.S. 



In this paper the author described the occurrence of true Coal- 

 measures near Erekli, on the north coast of Asia Minor, from 

 observations made by him when on service in the Black Sea in 1854. 

 The coal was obtained near Kosloo, about 30 miles east of Erekli, 

 whei'e it cropped out on the sides of a valley, and was worked by 

 horizontal drifts. The district was much disturbed by faults, and 

 the workings could only be driven from 100 to 400 yards into the 

 hill. In the eastern ridge bounding the valley of Kosloo there were 

 11 or 12 seams of coal of different thicknesses in a distance from 

 N. to S. of about 2 miles, one of them being about 18 feet thick, 

 and the best coal forming a seam of 4 ft. 10 in. The seams dipped 

 S.E. about 26°. They were inter stratified with shales, sandstones, 

 and conglomerates of quartz-pebbles, and occasionally with thin 

 bands of clay and ironstone. From some of the seams the author 

 obtained fossil remains of plants, which sufficiently prove that these 

 coals belong to the Carboniferous period. They include, according 

 to Mr. Etheridge, species of Lepidodendron, Lcpidostrobus, Calamites, 

 Pecopteris, Sphenopteris, Neuropteris (?), Sigillaria, Stigmaria, Glos- 

 sopteris (?), and Sphenophjllum. The author also noticed several 

 other localities in the immediate neighbourhood where coal was 

 known to exist under somewhat similar conditions. He also referred 

 to the geology of Erekli itself, and noticed especially the occurrence 

 of patches of more or less altered shales and marls, probably of 

 middle Tertiary age, overlying the igneous rocks of which the 

 country consists. 



2. " On the Structure and Affinities of the Genus Siplionia" By 

 W. J. Sollas, Esq., B.A., F.G.S. 



This paper contained, first, a full account of the history of the 

 genus Siplwnia, including a complete list of its described species, 

 and, next, a description of its general and minute structure. Its 

 skeletal network was shown to consist of spicular elements belonging 

 to the Lithistid type of sponges, and most closely allied in generic 

 details to the recent form Piscodermia polydiscus. Not only in this 

 character but in every other, Siphonia was shown to approach Pisco- 

 dermla so closely as to be almost identical with it. 



