Notes and Co^nments. 



323 



sections which we are enabled to reproduce by the permission 

 of the Geological Society. The first gives a diagrammatic repre- 

 sentation of the contemporaneous erosion of the Lias at East 

 Cliff, Whitby. Fig. 11. shows a section at the Boulby Alum 

 Works, where it is evident that at the eastern end of the section 

 the sandstone rests upon an eroded surface of Lias ; the Dogger 

 is apparently represented only by the basalt conglomerate at the 

 western end, and is absent tov/ards the east. 



EARLY SEED-BEARING PLANTS. 

 The Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society continues 

 to publish most valuable memoirs dealing with the various 

 branches of science and natural history in which its members 



Fig. i.—Spheaopteris fioninghausi. 



are interested. Before us is one of these, entitled ' The Early 

 History of Seed-bearing Plants as Recorded in the Carboniferous 

 Flora,' this being the Wilde Lecture delivered by Dr. D. H. 

 Scott, F.R.S. In this Dr. Scott carefully reviews the evidence 

 bearing' upon the question, and pays a well-deserved tribute to 

 French Palseo-Botanists for their share in this interesting study. 

 ' It is one of the great triumphs of the French School of Fossil 

 Botany (although we may not accept their results in detail) to 

 have first grasped the fertile idea that nearly-related plants may 



1905 November i- 



