GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON. 
165 
2nd. The co-existence of the megatherium with the mammoth, 
mastodon_, horse, bison, and hippopotamus. 3rd. That the sm-- 
face of the country has undergone no sudden or violent change 
since those animals inhabited it, which is proved by the absence 
of all traces of diluvial action in the enveloping alluvium or sur- 
rounding country. 4th. That whatever changes of temperature 
'may have taken place since that time, fatal to the existence of 
those mammalia, the identity of the fossil with the existing spe- 
cies of the marine shells of the coast shows that the temperature 
of the ocean at a period prior to the existence of the megathe- 
rium, the mastodon, and the hippopotamus, was such as is con- 
genial to the present marine testacea of Georgia. 
^'Description of some Fossil Fruits from the Chalk-formation of 
the South-east of England.'' By Dr. Mantell, F.K.S., &c. 
The fruits described are three in number, viz. — 
1. Zamia Sussexiensis, Mantell. — From the greensand. A 
cone allied to the Zamia macrocephala, a greensand fossil from 
Kent, figured in Lindley and Hutton^s ^ Fossil Flora,^ pi. 125, 
from which it differs in form and in the number, size, and shape 
of its scales, which are more numerous, smaller, and more ob- 
long than in the Kentish species. It is five inches long, and at 
the greatest circumference measures six inches. It was found 
abound two years ago in an accumulation of fossil coniferous 
wood in a sand-bank at Selmeston, Sussex, at the junction of 
the Shanklin sand with the gault. Dr. Mantell having sent a 
cast of the only specimen found to M. Adolphe Brongniart, that 
distinguished botanist suggested that it might be either the 
stem of a young cycadaceous plant or the fruit of a Zamia, but 
the situation and small size of the stalk at the base, and the 
appearance of the scales, induce Dr. Mantel! to refer it to the 
latter. 
2. Abies Benstedi, Mantell. — From the greensand near Maid- 
stone, Kent. A beautiful cone found by Mr. W. H. Bensted in 
