576 Correspondence — Mr. 8. V. Wood. 



Southem Silurian region, Mr, Hopkinson will accept the undernoted 

 grouping of the new species : — 



Moffat Group, — Diplograptiis Jimbriatus. 



Corynoides gracilis. Hincksii. 



Graptolithus acutus. Dicranogi'aptiis rectus. 



Leadhills Group, — Common to Moffat and Leadhills 



Dendrograptus ramulus. Group, — 



DipLograptus Etheridgii. Graptolithus attenuatus. 



pinguis. Diplograptus penna. 



Geological Survey, E. L. Jack. 



Alexandria, 11 Nov., 1872. 



THE DIVINING ROD IN ESSEX. 



Sir, — Mr. H. B. Woodward's surprise as to the existence of a 

 belief in the powers of the Divining Eod will, I think, give way as 

 he finds it is much more firmly believed in by west-country people 

 than is commonly imagined. A few days ago I was travelling in 

 company with a gentleman to whom I had been introduced, who is 

 a civil engineer and architect. He was telling me of some borings 

 he had to conduct in Essex, in the London -clay, for water. I 

 immediately referred him to Mr. W. Whitaker's recently published 

 memoir on the London Basin, in which is given such a copious list 

 of well and other borings, thinking these might help him. I was 

 replied to with a smile of self-satisfaction, and presently informed 

 that when he wished to find water, he always used a forked hazel 

 wand, which plainly and distinctly " turned in his hand " in the 

 direction where water lay, and that he had never known this plan to 

 fail ! My purpose in writing is to recommend the practice to the 

 Geological Survey, so that a corps of hazel-wand explorers might 

 be formed and drilled ! It would be a novelty to have a " Professor 

 of the Divining Eod " at Jermyn Street ! 



Ipswich. J. E. Taylok. 



CORALLINE CRAG FOSSILS. 



Sir, — As Dr, Allman has not confirmed the statement made in the Geol. Mag. 

 (ante p. 337) respecting the presence of Furfur a lapillus in the Coralline Crag, I 

 presume the name of that species cannot be introduced into my Catalogue. 



Hydractinia is a fossil not very rare in the Coralline Crag, and I have also found it 

 in the Red Crag, but in this latter formation it is possibly a derivative from the 

 older bed. The shell this Hydroid has generally selected for investiture is Trophon 

 consociale (Crag Moll., vol. i., p. 49, tab. vi. f. 11) : a specimen novr in my possession 

 has nearly half the shell exposed. This fossil has been long knovrn, and the name of 

 it was inserted in my " Catal. of Zoophytes from the Crag " (Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist, 

 vol. xiii. p. 21, 1844), as Alcyonidium circumvestiens. The generic name Alcyonidium, 

 Lamouroux, was adoptedjby Dr. Geo. Johnston in his work on the British Zoophytes, 

 where, at p. 304, he describes Alcyonium eckinatum of Montague and Fleming, and 

 of which a very indifferent and incorrect figure is given. He there speaks of the 

 papillse as " arranged in rows," but those upon the fossil not having that regularity, 

 and apparently larger and comparatively fewer in number, as well as having the 

 layers in some parts (from successive generations) of nearly half an inch in thickness, 

 I thought it might be specifically distinct. I have, however, since then obtained a 

 recent specimen covering a dead shell of Natica catena, on which the papillse are not 

 in rows, but irregular, like those upon the Crag fossil. Its correct specific determina- 

 tion must be left for future observers. Searles V. Wood. 



