NOTES — PALEONTOLOGY. 



71 



Brickyard Pond, disused), Urostyla grajidis^ Uvel/a virescens, Vorticella 

 nebulifera (these three in Askern Pool and effluent drain), Vaginicola 

 crystallina. Polypi and Polyzoa. — Hydra viridis and H. vulgaris^ 

 Plumatella repens (pond in four-acre glebe field belonging to Rev. 

 F. W. Peel, between Owston and Burghwallis). Rotatoria. — Brachi- 

 onus aniphiceros, Flosciilaria orfiata, Lepidella einarginata^ Lindia 

 to7'ulosa (these two in a pool belonging to Mr. Townsend, of the 

 South Parade Baths, Askern), Megalotrocha Jlavicans, Melicerta 

 rmgens (cases only, Thorpe Brickyard Pond, in abundance), Monocerca 

 rattus, Pterodma patina (Shirley Pool), Philodina e7'ythrophthalma^ 

 Rotifer vulgaris (Askern Pool and effluent drain), Step/ia?ioceros 

 eicJiornii (once only, Thorpe Brickyard Pond, disused). 



NOTES— PALEONTOLOGY. 



Post- tertiary deposits at Boston.— [The Rev. E. ]\Iaule Cole, 

 President of the Geological Section of the Yorkshire Naturalists' Union, has 

 received the following communication from ^Nlr. W. H. AMieeler, C. E., who is 

 superintending the excavations being made at Boston, Lincolnshire, for the new 

 dock and outfall of the river.] 



' Below a surface deposit of alluvium we came upon beds of peat and sand 

 containing remains of large trees and a great deal of birch bark, the silvery 

 appearance of which was as bright as if it had recently been cut down. Some of 

 the oak when first taken out was so soft that an impression could be made on it 

 with the fingers. On exposure it hardened and in time became as hard as ebony, 

 and if turned in the lathe took a beautiful polish. Below the peat was a thick 

 layer of boulder clay, largely interspersed with chalk, which gave it a grey appear- 

 ance. Below this was a deposit of boulder clay of a lead colour, or nearly black. 

 In this were a great number of septaria. This lower layer was evidently of entirely 

 difterent formation from the former. Both contained large numbers of ice-scratched 

 boulders of various rocks. I collected between thirty and forty specimens of 

 different rocks. Mixed about in the upper layer of Boulder Clay were pockets of 

 gravel and sand. The sand varied in colour from almost white to red.' — W. H. 

 Wheeler, Boston, December 1886. 



Discovery of a Fossil Tree at Ilkley.— The specimen was first 



reported by Mr. Pease, a visitor at Ben Rhydding, and as a record of the same 

 was desirable, I and my friends (Messrs. Brownridge, F.G.S., and Hoffman 

 Wood, E.G. S. ) have visited the locality for that purpose. It is in a quarry just 

 under the bold escarpment which overhangs the valley, and close to the celebrated 

 ' Cow and Calf rocks. The stone is of the ' Third Grits ' in the Millstone Grit 

 series, known also as the Addingham Edge Rock. This rock is evenly bedded, 

 tabular, and of considerable thickness, and in one of the vertical faces of the rock 

 just uncovered there lies horizontally the straight cylindrical stem of a small fossil 

 tree. The length at present exposed is 9 ft. 2. in., with a diameter of 12 in. at 

 one end and 9 in. at the other. Both ends are buried in the solid rock. When 

 first revealed it was covered with a black carbonaceous bark, but relic hunters 

 possessing more idle curiosity than love for science have removed it very com- 

 pletely. Now that the bark has been removed, there can be seen small ridges on 

 the surface running round the tree, at distances from each other varying from 

 in. to 3'in., and also at the thinner end can be faintly discerned small hollows 

 as if caused by excrescences upon the bark, these are irregular in position. To 

 determine the species of this fossil it would be necessary to have transverse, radial, 

 and longitudinal sections of it, and these cannot be obtained from its imperfect 

 state; moreover, specimens from the Millstone Grit do not generally retain much 

 of their structure. However, it is probable that it is a small drifted specimen of 

 those fossil conifers known as Dadoxylon. — S. A. Adamsox, November iith, 1886. 

 March 1887. 



