CORRESPONDENCE. 



235 



communication published in the Transactions of the Institute of 

 France, denies that there is any evidence for the assertion that these 

 are works of art, and he also takes exception to the name given to 

 them in this country. He asserts that these fossils are found in the 

 Chalk, perforated in the same manner as those specimens found in 

 the Drift ; and adds that this is not surprising, because the central 

 part of the sponges is generally cellular ! Surely the latter assertion 

 cannot be accepted as a satisfactory account of the Coscinopora. 



Under the present aspect of the question, it may be considered as not 

 unworthy of discussion in these pages, and with this view it is sug- 

 gested that some account of the observations of geologists well ac- 

 quainted with the condition of these fossils in their natural beds in 

 the chalk should be solicited, as well as of those who find them in 

 their transported position in the Drift. "With this view I forward 

 specimens from the gravel for comparison with any which may be 

 obtained from the chalk ; and it will be well if a microscopic exami- 

 tion of the borings in both kinds be made, so as to afford some 

 information upon the mode in which they were drilled. I think it 

 may be taken as a certainty that the Coacinopora or Orbitolina, in its 

 first or living state, has no hole through it, but a small indentation, 

 which may be observed in many of those in a fossil state. But on 

 this point valuable information could be given by Mr. Kupert Jones, 

 who is so well acquainted with the Poraminifera, if he will pardon 

 my reference to him. At all events, the perfect hole through the ball 

 is not, in my opinion, a part of the natural structure of this variety 

 of the OrhiioUna, and the question is therefore, was it a work of sim- 

 ple art of some of the earliest tribes of the human family ? 



COEEESPONDENCE. 



TJie so-called Beads from tJie Drift. 



Dear Sir, — In re^Dly to the above inquiry respecting the small, subglobu- 

 lar, perforated bodies found not uufrequently in the gravel of chalk-districts, 

 and particularly noticed to occur in Bedfordshire and at St. Acheul, I have 

 to state that, as everybody knows, they have been derived from the Chalk, 

 in yrhich similar fossils are abundantly found, either in the perforated con- 

 dition, or solid, or with a more or less shallow hole in their substance. 

 They may be found by careful search in the chalk itself, on the beaches 

 under chalk-clifFs (as at Eamsgate, etc.), and in drift beds the materials of 

 ■y^ hich have been furnished by the Chalk (in the gravels above-mentioned, 

 in more limited deposits of chalky drift, as at Copford, Essex, or in 

 the decomposed surface of chalk and chalk-marl along the bottom slopes of 

 the North and South Downs). 



These little fossils have had several names given to them, and they have 

 usually been regarded as sponges ; but, in 1860, my friend Mr. W. K. 

 Parker and myself were led to study them in the course of our researches 

 on Foraminifera, on account of one curious httle form after another coming 

 under our notice from different sea-sands and fossil deposits, all of which 



