president's address. 203 



other known country do they occur in so unique and interesting 

 a manner as they do at this locality and a few other places in 

 the county of Durham. 



In one part of the cliff we carefully examined the huge con- 

 globated masses of limestone, with a structure radiating from the 

 centre of the ball to the outer rim, or, as it is more frequently 

 the case, the spheres have a more homogeneous appearance, each 

 ball touching the adjoining ones in some part of its circum- 

 ference. In continuation the same beds become botryoidal in 

 structure, the little spheres being not larger than marbles, 

 quite as round, and touching and united to each other, so that 

 when a small piece is detached it has quite the appearance of a 

 bunch of grapes. The interstices between the several spheres 

 are generally filled with a fine, soft yellow marl. The theory 

 proposed and discussed with some amiable warmth was the in- 

 filtration of lime subsequent to the deposition of the beds of soft 

 marl, and the stalactitial arrangement of the infiltred matter 

 into the shape of small balls or spheres in the original bed of soft 

 marl, the marl itself being either incorporated or replaced. 



During our survey of this half a mile of cliff, the majority of 

 our friends had passed beyond view. So we began, as the old 

 botanists say, "to cull simples," and we gathered not a few sea- 

 shore species of plants. We were more fortunate in being able 

 to collect some fine specimens of Helix virgata along the short 

 range of sand-banks still left, though much altered, by the 

 continually extended "improvements," as they are somewhat 

 doubtfully called. 



On former occasions the members of the Club have had, though 

 rare, an opportunity of examining a piece of submerged forest, 

 situated at the south end of "Whitburn sand. This can only be 

 seen when the "set" of the tide from some long-prevailing wind 

 washes the sand and gravel entirely out of this part of the bay. 

 Then can be seen, beneath a surface-layer of clay, a deposit of 

 vegetable matter, leaves, nuts, stems, and roots of trees; and 

 other organisms, similar to the submerged forest, that extends 

 under the sands, from "West Hartlepool to the mouth of the Tees 

 and which occurs also in many other parts of the east coast. 



