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heretofore been regarded by Professor Jukes as due to the igneous action of 
the basalt. Now, however, he announces a fact which explains this expla- 
nation away. Above the gravel, but underlying the basalt, he has found a 
thick bed of clay, enclosing a thin layer of lignite, which in some places 
had the appearance of coal. Hence he concludes, that as the heat of the 
basalt did not indurate the clay and alter the lignite, it could not possibly 
have affected the flints. — Vide Geological Magazine^ August. 
The Geology of the Ancients. — In a work which deals with the geological 
attempts of the Greeks, from the earliest ages down to the epoch of Alex- 
ander, Dr. Julius Schvarcz arrives at the following conclusions : — (1) The 
Greeks were acquainted with all four classes of volcanic action, earthquakes, 
thermal springs, solfataras, volcanoes proper. (2) The Greeks also observed 
and investigated the phenomena of alluvial activity. (3) The changes 
taking place in the organic world did not form a part of the study of the 
Greeks, for they had arrived at no idea of a “ genus ” or species,” nor 
even of the distinctions of animal and vegetable kingdoms. The whole life 
of the universe appeared to them as the life of an organism, ever fluctuating, 
without any such pivots as the divisions and subdivisions of our modern 
zoological and botanical classifications. Their idea of the origin of animals 
was that genesis was not yet finished, but was going on in the days of 
Pericles, even in the formation of new stars. (4) They knew and under- 
stood the real organic origin of fossils j it was only in the time of Aristotle 
that such remains were attributed to “ peculiar species of animals living 
underground.” (5) The doctrine of the gradual degeneration of mankind, 
common to most Greek sages, may have originated from the misinterpre- 
tation of the huge fossil skeletons of Pachyderms, discovered in Greece, 
and held to be the remains of men of gigantic size. (6) Perhaps the 
highest idea which seems to have been actually arrived at by Aristarchus in 
the third century before Christ — if not at a far earlier i.e. Babylonian period 
— was the Heliocentric idea, that “ those stars which do not err, and the 
sun, remain immovably at rest f and that in the circumference (orbit) of 
a circle the earth is moving around the sun, the latter being placed in the 
centre of the orbit.” 
British Fossil Crustacece. — Workers in the interesting but difiicult depart- 
ment of Palaeontology should consult the various important memoirs which 
are being contributed from month to month to the Geological Magazine by 
Mr. Henry Woodward. Each paper is accompanied by a lithographic page- 
plate in Mr. W. V^est’s best style. 
A new Freshwater Deposit near Stoke Newington has been discovered by 
Mr. Alfred Tylor, who in a letter to the Geological Magazine for August, 
gives an account of the locality, the beds, and the fossil treasures. 
The last Meeting of the Geological Society. — The large number of valuable 
papers read at this meeting precludes our giving more than a short notice of 
two or three of especial interest. The first of these was on the distrihidion 
of flint implements in Southern India^ and was presented by Mr. R. Bruce 
Foote, of the Indian Geological Survey. The chipped stone implements of 
Southern India are found in, or associated with, two formations — the coast- 
laterite, which is a marine formation, and a freshwater deposit, occurring 
inland at greater elevations above the sea. Most of them have been found 
