SCIENTIFIC SUMMARY. 525 
genus was nearly related to the group Eurypterida which occurs in newer 
Palaeozoic rocks. 
Professor Owen has described five new small reptiles from the coal of 
Nova Scotia, which, from their size and teeth, are supposed to have been 
insectivorous, so that, could it have been preserved, one might expect to find 
an abundant insect fauna in these old rocks. 
Professor Heer, after a careful study of the plant remains from the upper- 
most Eocene of the Isle of Wight, has decided that, like the Bovey-Tracey coal 
of Devon, the beds should be classed as Lower Miocene. It is important, 
however, as suggested by Professor Ramsey, to remember how slight our know- 
ledge of fossil plants yet is, •when it is brought forward to override evidence 
of the immeasurably better known group of fossil shells. The molluscan 
remains had scarcely suggested a doubt as to the Eocene age of the deposits ; 
hence it is far from unlikely that the final result of these conclusions by 
Professor Heer will be to remove into the older formation many beds now 
believed to be Miocene. 
In a new species of Eurypterus from the coal-measures, Mr. Salter finds 
the sides of the back ornamented with ramifying spines looking like miniature 
trees, a character which, besides being very beautiful, is interesting as the 
only case of its kind known in the animal kingdom. 
Among the reptilian fossils brought by Prince Alfred from South Africa, 
is the pelvis of a large Dicynodon, in which the three bones on each side are, 
as in mammals and some lizards, anchylosed, or united into one bone, forming 
a strong support for the hind legs ; but the anchylosis has gone further than 
in any mammal, for the two Ossa innominata, as these bones are called, are 
united into one strong hoop. From the strength of this remarkable pelvis on 
to which the ribs abut, Professor Owen anticipates that, when found, the hind 
limbs will be large, — keeping the body well off the ground. It may be 
remarked that this genus has another mammalian resemblance in its two 
walrus-like teeth. 
In the Raniganj coal-field in India, which is by far the most important, 
there are 49 collieries, many with several workings, about one half of which 
are ordinary quarries and the others pits. The thickness of the seam varies 
from 5 to 35 feet, and except in the thickest deposits the whole depth is 
worked. This coal is considered by Dr. Oldham (Superintendent of the 
Survey) as Triassic, on the grounds that it contains a single minute crusta- 
cean (Estheria minuta), common in the Trias of Europe ; that among the 
genera of plants, which for the most part range through the Secondary and 
Carboniferous rocks, there is one hitherto only found in the Trias, and also 
that Dicynodont and Labyrinthodont reptiles have been found, such as occur 
in strata in Africa, supposed to be Triassic. It is possibly of this age, as it 
might be of any other. But the biologist remembering that distribution in 
space is the index of correspondingly long duration in time, will not regard 
the age as so well determined that it can be used as a datum for interpreting 
the much-disputed age of the Australian coal-measures which have some 
fossils in common. 
Captain Playfair, of Aden, reports a volcanic eruption near the Straits of 
Bab-el-mandeb in May last, accompanied with earthquakes, in which the sky 
became pitch dark, and the volcano ejected first fine white dust, and after- 
