Prof. Oiucn — On a New Fossil Bird. 129 



Dr. Andrews believes that the waters suddenly retired after the 

 deposition of the orange loam, as, from the uplands of Wisconsin to 

 the Ohio Kiver, over a descent of more than l,i>00 feet, no shingle- 

 beach has been found. " It is possible," he continues, " that this 

 sudden retirement, and the constant rush of waters, was the cause 

 of the valleys of our streams being excavated to such an enormous 

 breadth, compared with the feeble brooks that now meander through 

 them."— D. M. 



11. — New British Fossil Bied. — " On the Cranium of a Gigantic 

 Bird (Dasoniis londincnsis, Owen), from the London clay of Sheppey, 

 Kent." Under the above heading, Professor Owen has described 

 and figured ^ the cranium of a large bird, which is interesting, not 

 only on account of the rare occurrence of Ornithic remains in the 

 British Lower Tertiary deposits, but also from combining certain 

 characters of form and proportion with the large extinct birds of New 

 Zealand, and also with the existing Struthionidas. Like them, the 

 Professor considers it to have been teri'estrial in its habits. That 

 it was of huge size is evidenced by the cranium, which is as large as 

 that of the Binornis giganteus, Owen, with which, and other species of 

 Dinornithic and Struthionoid skulls it has been elaborately compared. 

 Prof. Owen, in referring to the discovery of the large limb-bones 

 (femur, tibia, and a portion of a fibula) of Gastornis Parisiensis, Heb., 

 in the Plastic clay at Meudon, near Paris, thinks that it, like 

 Binornis, will " prove to be tridactyle and terrestrial," and that it is 

 possible that this portion of skull may ultimately be found to belong 

 to the same genus as the Parisian bird. The cranium of Basornis 

 is in the British Museum. — The same part of the Transactions con- 

 tains two papers by Prof. Owen, in continuation of his many valuable 

 contributions on the osteology of the extinct Birds of New Zealand 

 — one on the sternum, the other on the cranium, of several species of 

 Binornis — both papers being illustrated Avith several plates. — W.D. 



Geological Society of London. — January 26th, 1870. — Prof, 

 Huxlej^ LL.D., F.E.S., President, in the Chair. — The following 

 communication was read : — " On the Crag of Norfolk and associated 

 Beds." By Joseph Prestwich, Esq., F.E.S., F.G.S. The author 

 commenced by referring to his last paper, in which he divided the 

 Ked Crag into two divisions — a lower one, of variable oblique bedded 

 strata, and an upper one, of sands passing up into the clay known as 

 the ChUlesford clay. In 1849 he had alluded to the possibility of 

 this clay being synchronous with the Norwich Crag. He has since 

 traced this upper or Chillesford division of the Eed Crag northwards, 

 with a view to determine its relation to the Norwich Crag. He has 

 found it at various places inland, but the best exhibition of it occurs 

 in the Easton Bavant Cliffs. He there found in it a group of shells 

 ^ Transactions of the Zoological Society of London, vol. vii., pt. 2, p. 145. 



VOL. VII. — NO. LXIX. 9 



