FOSSIL PLANTS FEOM THE HUTTON COLLECTION. 19 



II. — Contributions toivards a Catalogue of the Flora of the Car- 

 boniferous System of Northumberland and Durham. 

 Part I. — Fossil Plants from the Sutton Collection. 



Catalogue of those specimens of the Sutton Collection of Fossil 

 Plants that have been presented to the Natural History Society 

 by the Council of the Mining Institute, and are now exhibited 

 in the Geological Room of the Museum, at Barras Bridge, 

 Newcastle-upon-Tyne. By Bichaud Howse. 



Fkoh a circular issued in February, 1829, by the founders of 

 the Natural History Society, we learn tbat one of the leading 

 features of the Society was to be the formation of Collections of 

 Fossil Organic Bemains, especially tbe Fossil Plants of the local 

 Coal-measures. Up to this time, it appears, there was no public 

 or even extensive private collection of these fossils in Newcastle, 

 for the same gentlemen express a regret that ' ' Brongniart, the 

 celebrated French naturalist, when he was preparing materials 

 for his great work on Vegetable Fossils, now in the course of 

 publication, came down to the north in the full expectation of 

 finding a Collection of Vegetable Fossils in Newcastle, and, of 

 course, was much disappointed." 



Brongniart's visit would be about the year 1825, for we know 

 that shortly after this time Coal -measure Plants were sent from 

 Newcastle to Brongniart by James Losh, Esq., Becorder of New- 

 castle ; and also that drawings of some of our local Coal Fossils 

 were sent to both Sternberg and Brongniart by the Bev. ~W. 

 Buckland, Sir "W. C. Trevelyan, and a Dr. Taylor, of Durham, 

 who, we are told, had made drawings of Coal-measure Plants 

 with the intention of publishing them. 



It was then about this time, 1829, that Mr. ¥m. Hutton, 

 who was one of the first Secretaries of the Natural History So- 

 ciety, began to form his Collection of Fossil Plants, and also to 

 have drawings made from his own collection, from specimens in 

 the newly -formed Museum of the Natural History Society, and 



