Mallee Scrub, Lower Murray River. 145 



Silurian micaceous sandy slate, which were unjustly claimed 

 afterwards another person as his discovery, and whose un- 

 founded claim to priority of observation have been improperly 

 acknowledged even by the Government Geological Surveyor in 

 his report. In justice to myself, I must claim publicly to have 

 been the first observer of the same, and Mr. Edward Wilson 

 and others, as well as the Government Geologist himself, I doubt 

 not, will bear me out in this assertion. I had secured the first 

 specimens found by me in the Police Paddock, and subsequently 

 placed them in the Museum. One of them disappeared when 

 that institution was under my charge, the other specimen must 

 be there still 



The specimen of fucoidae here in question, (vide plate, natural 

 size), I found in the quarry near the gates of the Botanical 

 Gardens, in the same stone in which I detected in 1851 the 

 fossils, drawing of which I have embodied in the transactions 

 of our society for 1855, vide page 222, fig. 301 to 305. 



My attention was drawn to about a dozen flat stones, laid by 

 order of our gallant Director of the Botanical Gardens, Dr. Mueller, 

 in the dirt, to assist the ladies in crossing a muddy spot in the 

 lower walk along the banks of the Yarra. Our learned friend 

 did not, I suppose, anticipate the valuable fossil he thus caused 

 to be exhibited. 



The fucoidae are plants of a very peculiar character, and so 

 nearly allied to the Infusoria already above described, that it is 

 only very recently that they have been considered plants and 

 not animals. But still, they form the third division of the 

 Algae, which are the transition forms between animal and vege- 

 table life. They live principally in saltwater, and are not 

 uncommonly divided into a kind of trunk and leaf-like blade. 

 The form here in question may be the remarkable " Hydrogas- 

 trum." Infusoria have neither bones nor muscles ; neither 

 bloodvessels nor nerves, but still they have independent motion ; 

 they feed by means of a mouth, and hunt for their prey. 



The confervae swim in water with great activity, have no 

 mouth, and contain starch, which cannot be detected in infu- 

 soria or other animals. Very conflicting opinions have been 

 entertained by different naturalists on this subject, but the 

 existence of Albuminous matter may be taken as a guide. Where- 

 ever this is found we have good grounds for assigning the pro- 

 duct to the vegetable kingdom, and where its non-existence can 

 be shown to classify the product under the animal section. 



There exist plants which have cells independent of each 

 other Hke Infusoria, or united into simple threads (confervae), 



