COEBESPO>^DE>'CE. 
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 Coscinopora or Orhitolina, 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. Hupert Jones, 
who is so well acquainted with the Foraminifera, 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 Orhitolina, and the question is therefore, was it a work of sim- 
ple art of some of the earliest tribes of the human famil}' ? 
COEEESPOXDEXCE. 
The so-called Beads from the Drift. 
Deae Sir, — In reply to the above inquiry respecting the small, subglobu- 
lar, perforated bodies found not unfrequently in the gravel of chalk-districts, 
and particular!}^ 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 which 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 
which 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 little form after another coming 
under our notice from different sea-sands and fossil deposits, all of whicn 
