part 1] THE westphaliajst, etc. of east glamorgais^. 73 



sandstone, on the ground that otherwise the shrinkage due to loss 

 of volatile constituents would have caused the pebble to contract 

 away from the surrounding matrix ; this contention assumed the 

 early consolidation of the Coal Measures, but the analogy of the 

 Tertiary deposits of the Isle of Wight shows that strata containing 

 beds of coal or lignite may remain unconsolidated for long periods ; 

 furthermore, the process of conversion of vegetable matter into 

 lignite may be accomplished in a very short time : for instance, 

 lignite of Pleistocene age in Alaska had been described. 



Dr. Marie Stopes expressed her appreciation of the paper, but 

 as she had not yet seen the manuscript, and it contained so vast 

 an amount of detail, she found it impossible to discuss it fully. 

 She wished to accentuate the importance of the work done, and 

 also its magnitude ; the task of recording and identifying 45,000 

 specimens in the field was truly an immense labour, and this 

 careful statistical work had not hitherto been done in connexion 

 with fossil plants. 



As a result of the Author's arduous work, the speaker had 

 hoped that one special point might be illuminated, but, through 

 no fault of his own, it was not yet cleared up. The coal-pebbles 

 described, upon which Prof. Kendall had commented, were natur- 

 ally of considerable interest ; but they indicated a physical break 

 in the deposition. 



She had hoped that the Author might bring facts to light which 

 would illustrate the phylogenetic evolution of the various species 

 within the genera ; but, owing to this break in continuous deposi- 

 tion, such results could not be expected. She urged other colliery- 

 managers. whose seams showed o-ood attendant fossils and in beds 

 passing without physical break from one major division to another, 

 to spend some years collecting such detailed statistical evidence as 

 would illustrate the plwlogeny of the species within the well- 

 known genera. 



In conclusion, the speaker hoped that the Author's careful work 

 would be followed by similar statistical enumeration of the distri- 

 bution of fossil plants. She warmly congratulated hira on his 

 enthusiasm, and on the successful accomplishment of his arduous 

 task. 



Mr. E. A. Martin remarked that, if ferns and Pteridosperms 

 indicated elevated land, they must have undergone much drifting 

 to have become embedded in the shales at the level of the marshes. 

 Did they show any greater degree of drifting than other forms of 

 vegetation ? The coal-pebbles did not, in his opinion, indicate 

 great lapse of time between the deposition of the coal and the 

 sandstone, but rather that the formation of coal was a more rapid 

 process than was generally thought to be the case. 



Prof. A. H. Cox wished, as a worker in South Wales, to add his 

 congratulations to those of previous speakers The Author had 

 devoted 25 years to the assembling of the material on which the 

 paper was based, and the results were many-sided in their im- 

 portance. He felt that South Wales was fortunate in having a 



Q.J. a.S. No. 805. & 



