36 PROCEEDINGS OF TKE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETF. [Apr. 14, 



Capt. Alexander many years since procured a Cetotolite from the 

 Coralline Crag, a notice of which was given in the Proceedings of 

 the Society*. This ear-bone was found on that part of the Coralline 

 Crag which is composed entirely of the calcareous remains of the 

 Bryozoa, where scarcely a single shell is to be met with, and which 

 may be considered as having been formed in somewhat shallow 

 water. Now, since the Coralline Crag is destitute of extraneous 

 material (or at least nearly so), it would, I consider, be a conclusion 

 unsupported by evidence to assign to a bone of this nature a deri- 

 vative, rather than a proper character, with reference to the de- 

 posit in which it occurs. There seems to me to be no reason for 

 supposing but that the animal to which this ear-bone belonged was 

 an inhabitant of the seas of the Coralline Crag Period, and had 

 been stranded in the manner in which Cetaeea are often found on 

 our own shores at the present day. I may, however, add, that I 

 have found a few small vertebrae, as also a few fragments of larger 

 bones, in the CoraUine Crag belonging probably to the Cetaeea ; but 

 I have never seen from that formation a vertebra which could be 

 said to have belonged to any animal possessing such otolites as the 

 one found by Capt. Alexander in the Coralline Crag, or as are now 

 yielded in such numbers by the Red Crag. Mr. John Brown, F.G.S., 

 has obtained a small Cetotolite from the Coralline Crag, at Sudbourne, 

 precisely resembling specimens which have been found rather nu- 

 merously in the Eed Crag at Sutton ; so that the evidence is strong 

 that some of these Cetacean remains of the Eed Crag have been 

 derived from the formation immediately antecedent, namely, the 

 Coralline Cragf. Mr. Acton has recently obtained three or four 

 Cetacean teeth, around which is an agglomeration similar to that 

 which is commonly seen adhering to the teeth of Lamna, Otodus, &c., 

 fossils belonging to the Older Tertiaries : but the material surround- 

 ing the Cetacean teeth diifers in composition from that which sur- 

 rounds the base of the fish-teeth of the London Clay. The two 

 therefore, from this evidence, do not appear to be derived from the 

 same source. 



In my Monograph of the Crag MoUusca (Palseontograph. Society) 

 these Whales' bones were inadvertently placed with the Older 

 Tertiary fossils. The mineral, or rather the metallic, character of 

 these remains probably owes its origin to the Eed Crag itself, as it 

 pervades the specimens undoubtedly derived from the Older Ter- 



* Geol. Proc. vol. iii. p. 10, 1838. 



t A few hours previous to the reading of this paper, a very interesting draw- 

 ing of a vertebra was obligingly sent to me from Malta by Sir Wm. Reid, 

 F.G-.S. (lately deceased). This is a representation of a bone evidently be- 

 longing to one of the Marine Mammalia ; and I have also since received, from 

 the same source, a fossil which appears to be the fragment of a rib of an animal 

 of that class. I am also informed that Cetotolites have been found at Malta in 

 association with the teeth of Carcharodon megalodon. 



I feel rather at a loss to venture an opinion as to whence these Cetacean 

 bones now found so abundantly in the Eed Crag were derived. The Coralline 

 Crag may have contributed a large portion, while it is still possible some may- 

 have been contemporaneous with the C. onegalodon. 



