SCIENTIFIC SUMMARY. 
203 
and was found to be of good thickness and quality. The total depth reached 
was 808 yards, and the ultimate temperature in the coal itself was found to 
be 93^-° F. The manager of the colliery, Mr. Bryham, sensible of the value 
of observations on the temperature of the strata at such unusual depths (this 
being probably the deepest colliery in the world, certainly in Britain), made 
a series of observations with as much care as the circumstances would 
admit, and has entrusted them to me for publication. The mode of taking 
the observations was as follows : — On a favourable stratum, such as shale, 
or even coal, having been reached, a hole was drilled with water in the 
solid strata to a depth of one yard from the bottom of the pit. A thermo- 
meter was then inserted, the hole having been sealed and made air-tight with 
clay. At the expiration of half an hour the thermometer was taken up and 
the reading noted. The paper then gives a series of important facts showing 
the comparisons between the temperature of the strata and that of the ad- 
jacent air. 
The Palceontographical Societies' Monographs. — The twenty-third volume 
of these excellent publications (that for 1869) has been issued. This 
volume appears in good time, owing to the energy of the Honorary Secretary., 
the Bev. T. Wiltshire. The contents are as follows : — 1. Supplement to the 
Fossil Corals. Part II. No. 2. (Cretaceous Corals.) By Dr. P. Martin 
Duncan, F.R.S., &c. (Six Plates, pp. 20.) 2. The Cretaceous Ecliino- 
dermata. Vol. 1. Part 3. By Dr. T. Wright, F.R.S.E., F.G.S. (Ten 
Plates, pp. 13.) 3. The Belemnitkke. Part Y. Oxford Clay Belemnites, 
&c. By Professor Phillips, M.A., F.R.S , &c. (Nine Plates, pp. 19.) 4. 
The Fishes of the Old Bed Sandstone. By Messrs. J. Powrie and E. Ba} r 
Lankester. Part I., concluded. The Cephalaspidse. By E. Bay Lankester, 
B.A. (Nine Plates, pp. 29.) 5. The Reptilia of the Liassic Formations. 
Part II. By Professor Owen, F.R.S. (Four Plates, pp. 40.) 6. The Crag 
Cetacea. No. 1 ( Zipliius ). By Professor Owen, F.R.S. (Five Plates, pp. 
40.) 
Lady Geologists. — The Geological Magazine for March contains two good 
papers by Lady Geologists. The labours of rational women of this class are 
worth more than all the thousand-and-one howls of what the Saturday 
Review justly styles u The Shrieking Sisterhood.” 
Plants in the Schistose Rocks of the Highlands. — At the meeting of the 
Geological Society of Glasgow, on January 13, Mr. James Thomson read a 
paper “ On further Evidences of the Existence of Plant-remains in the 
Schistose Rocks of the West Highlands.” Mr. Thomson referred to a paper 
which he had read at the previous meeting, in which he had mentioned the 
probability of the occurrence of plant-remains in other parts of the West 
Highlands. This he had now been able to confirm by having found frag- 
ments of wood in a conglomerate, composed of talcose schist, with rounded 
pebbles of quartz, in Glencoe, where it occurs intercalated between beds of 
schist, which overlie the granite of the district. In connection with the 
subject, Mr. Thomson also read a paper 11 On the Vitrified Forts of Dunskaig 
and Carradale in Kintyre.” He described the form of these forts, and drew 
attention to fragments of charred wood which he had found imbedded 
between the angular pieces of the schistose rocks of which they are built. 
The walls of each of them are about 6 ft. thick, and on examination he had 
