568 The American Naturalist. [ ime 
l 
“This last opinion can claim the sanction of antiquity and the 
authority of weighty names, but the progress of investigation had 
largely diminished the number of its supporters, when it seemed to | 
receive a new life from a recognition of the amazing effects of 
mechanical forces in modifying- rock-structures, and from the above- 
named discoveries in the Alps. Specimens illustrative of the latter | 
were exhibited at the International Congress in September, 1888. , 
Those supposed to indicate the passage of an ordinary Jurassic lime- | 
_ stone into a crystalline marble (from a district which I had already 7 
visited) did not appear to me convincing. But those exhibiting fossils . 
in a rock resembling a true schist were certainly very remarkable, | 
and seemed to afford considerable support to the opinion mentioned 
above. I was, not, however, convinced by them, because, though I | 
had not examined the two localities in which the supposed ‘ fossili- 
ferous schists’ occurred, I was fairly acquainted with the geology of 
the district, and had been very near, in one case within less than a 
mile, to each locality. I had also examined rocks identical, as I | 
believed, with those in which the fossils occurred. The knowledge | 
thus obtained, notwithstanding the apparent evidence of the specimens 
exhibited, suggested to my mind the possibility of a mistake, and å 
doubt whether the identity of the fossiliferous rock with the true 
schists of the district was not more apparent than. real. Still, s0 
remarkable were the specimens, sọ great was the weight of authority, 
` that when these cases were quoted against me in the discussion on MY 
paper, I departed from that which has become almost a rule with me; 
viz.,to pay no regard to criticisms founded on second-hand information : 
—and stated that I accepted the challenge.” ` oa 
During the summer of 1889 Prof. Bonney resumed his study of the 
district under discussion in company with Mr. J. Eccles, F.G-S. 
results of their investigations fully confirm the conclusions Prof. Bonney 
had stated the year before. | 
The Australian Cenozoic Fauna.—Mr. J. W. Gregory 5375 
that this fauna seems to be composed of two constituents; about 3 
third are species of the ordinary Palearctic Upper Cretaceous genera; 
cated seem to have migrated southwards and become mingled on ther : 
Journey with a fauna that agrees most closely with that of the Eocents 
of India and Malaysia. No abyssal types were picked up OP ~~ : 
march, nor do any of the species retain any trace of the influencë r 
. deep-sea habitat. Hence the route may have followed the coasts = 
Asia and Malaysia, or the line may have lain across what is now 
