Jan. 5, 1853.] tufnell — fossil plants from Shetland. 49 



of denudation were greater than at present, and the suppHes to rivers 

 more extensive, the fluctuations of the sea-level and the elevation of 

 the beds and plains of rivers vrould have been proportionally greater ; 

 and there would still have existed some localities where the rate of the 

 formation of the alluvial plains near the sea kept pace with the eleva- 

 tion of the waters ; so that, as at the present time, conditions would have 

 existed for the accumulation of fluviatile strata containing terrestrial 

 remains without the occurrence of any subsidence of the land. Hence 

 it would be difficult to determine, when examining sections of thick 

 fluviatile strata, whether these accumulations of detrital matter had 

 been formed during subsidence of the land, or during that gradual 

 elevation of the level of rivers and seas arising from the continued 

 operation of ordinary physical causes. 



January 5, 1853.. 



Edward Joseph Lowe, Esq., and Thomas Allison Readwin, Esq., 

 were elected Fellows. 



The following communications were read : — 



1. Notice of the Discovery of Fossil Plants in the Shetland 

 Islands. By the Rt. Hon. Henry Tufnell. In a letter to 

 Sir R. I. Murchison, F.G.S. With Remarks on the Fossil Plants, 

 by Dr. J. D. Hooker, F.R.S., G.S. ; and on the Sandstone in 

 which they occur, by Sir R. I. Murchison, F.R.S., G.S. 



I shall be much obliged if you will present to the Geological 

 Society, for me, the accompanying fossils, which I procured this year 

 during a visit to the Shetland Isles, from a quarry, called the South 

 Ness Quarry, about a quarter of a mile from the Tower of Lerwick. 

 I obtained, with the fossil, a portion of the matrix in which it was 

 imbedded, and as I believe no fossil of this description, if it be a 

 Calamite, has been discovered in the Old Red Sandstone, I thought 

 it might not be unworthy a place in the Museum of the Geological 

 Society. 



A very intelligent master mason in the Town of Lerwick, has in 

 his possession some fossils of a similar kind, which were dug out of 

 the same quarry, but I thought that this specimen might be sufficient. 



Note on the Fossil Plants /rom the Shetlands. Bv Dr. Joseph 

 D. Hooker, F.R.S., G.S. 



I have examined very carefully the specimens of fossil plants com- 

 municated by Mr. Tufnell. All are in a very unsatisfactory state, 

 but appear to belong to two species of Calamites, which, the articu- 

 lations being nearly effaced, may be referable to known species, 

 or may be altogether new. Had such specimens been collected in 

 the Carboniferous formation, they would have been rejected as quite 

 undeterminable ; coming, however, as they do, from an older forma- 

 tion which has not been proved to contain fossil vegetables, they have 



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