384 Correspondence — Pro/, Boulger — Rev. P. B. Brodie. 



must be considered the origin of all the living floras of the globe ; 

 for in the fossil-flora of Sagor are found plants representative of 

 forms now found in Australia, North America and Mexico, California, 

 Chili, India and the East Indian islands, Europe, Africa, Norfolk 

 Island, and New Zealand. Examples of all these were cited. 



c oiRiaiESi^on^ jDiEnsrciB . 



A GEOLOGICAL MAP OF THE WORLD. 



Sir, — The want of a tolerably detailed large-scale map of the 

 world, coloured geologically for students and geologists generally, 

 has often occurred to me, and I venture to direct attention to it in 

 your columns. In the present impei-fect but advancing state of our 

 knowledge the publication of such a map, or of a geological atlas of 

 the world, would be worse than useless ; but surely one such map 

 might w^ell be displaj^ed in the galleries of the Natural History 

 Museum, or in some other similar national institution. The Jermyn 

 Street collections being exclusively British, the Natural History 

 Museum would seem the more appropriate place for it ; and, as 

 beautiful special diagrams of the anatomy of animals are now being 

 prepared there, no difficulty should arise in its preparation. If made 

 in several sheets mounted on canvas, these might be separately re- 

 placed by better ones as our knowledge increases ; and the adoption 

 of the system of colouring agreed upon by the International Con- 

 gress would serve to familiarize us in England with that code of the 

 future. We might well have far more detail than in Ami Bone's 

 map, and, in fact, I see no reason why, where our knowledge is full, 

 we should not have more detail than in other less known parts of tho 

 map ; but orographical matter had, perhaps, better be sparingly in- 

 troduced. Such a map is exhibited in the museum at Brussels, and 

 would, I should think, add much to the educational interest of our 

 national collection here. G. S. Boulger. 



18, Ladbeoke Grove, w. 



FOSSIL BIRDS. 



Sir, — My friend Dr. Woodward in his interesting paper on 

 "Wingless Birds in the Geological Magazine, Dec. III. Vol. II. No. 7, p. 

 308, alludes to the discovery of fossil feathers of bu-ds in some places abroad, 

 both in Jurassic and Tertiary strata, but he does not mention any as occurring 

 in England. It may be interesting to the readers of the Magazine to know 

 that a small feather is recorded by Mr. J. S. Gardner, from the Tertiary 

 Plant-beds at Bournemouth, and I have two portions of feathers from the 

 Eocene Berabridge Limestone at Gui-net Bay, near Cowes, Isle of Wight ; 

 ■which has yielded to the researches of Mr. A'Court Smith so many remarkable 

 Insect-remams, Arachnids, Crustacea and Plants, and of which I have a fine 

 series. Remains of Birds are almost as a matter of course unusually rare in any 

 fossiliferous rocks, and generally occur, as might be expected, in fluviatile or lacustrine 

 deposits, and feathers seem to be still more so. Those in my collection are only 

 fragmentary, merely the upper end of a very small feather; but perhaps Mr. Smith 

 may have more entire examples, though I am not aware of any others having been 

 met with in any older formations in this country. P. B. Bhodie, F.G.S. 



[To the foregoing should be added the following species : 

 Pelagornis Barretti (Seeley). Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. Aug. 1866. 

 £iialiornis Barretti. Seeley, Index to Fossil Remains, etc., 1869, Quart. Jouru. 

 Geol. Soc. Nov. 1876, pi. xxvi.-xxvii. H. W.j 



