330 
Reports and Proceedings — 
Count Gaston de Saporta, F.C.G.S., expressing the liope that Fellows 
of the Society would attend the meeting of the French Association 
for the Advancement of Science, which will be held in August next 
in Havre. Count de Saporta stated that any Fellows attending the 
Meeting will be exceedingly welcome, and that any who will send 
word previously of their intention to come will meet with a most 
cordial reception. In connexion with this it was further announced 
that, according to a circular from the Geological Society of Normandy, 
that Society proposes, during the meeting of the Association, to hold 
a Geological Exposition, intended as preliminary to that to be held 
in Paris next year, and that it invites co-operation. 
The following Communications were read ; — 
1. “Remarks on the Coal-bearing Deposits near Erekli, the 
ancient Heraclea, Pontus-Bithynia.” By Rear-Admiral T. A. B. 
Spratt, C.B., F.R.S., F.G.S. 
Jn this paper the author described the occurrence of true Coal- 
measures near Erekli, on the north coast of Asia Minor, from 
observations made by him when on Service in the Black Sea in 1854. 
The coal was obtained near Kosloo, about 30 miles east of Erekli, 
where it cropped out on the sides of a valle} 7 , and was worked by 
horizontal drifts. The district was much disturbed by faults, and 
the workings could only be driven from 100 to 400 yards into the 
liill. In the eastern ridge bounding the valley of Kosloo there were 
11 or 12 seams of coal of different thicknesses in a distance from 
N. to S. of about 2 miles, one of them being about 18 feet thick, 
and the best coal forming a seam of 4 ft. 10 in. The seams dipped 
S.E. about 26°. They were interstratified with shales, sandstones, 
and conglomerates of quartz-pebbles, and occasionally with thin 
bands of clay and ironstone. From some of the seams the author 
obtained fossil remains of plants, which sufficiently prove that these 
coals belong to the Carboniferous period. They include, according 
to Mr. Elheridge, species of Lepidodendron, Lcpidostrobus, Calamites, 
Pecopteris, Sphenopteris, Neuropteris (?), Sigillaria, Stigmaria, Glos- 
sopteris (?), and Sphenophjllum. The author also noticed several 
other localities in the immediate neighbourhood where coal was 
known to exist under somewhat similar conditions. He also referred 
to the geology of Erekli itself, and noticed especially the occurrence 
of patches of more or less altered shales and marls, probably of 
middle Tertiary age, overlying the igneous rocks of which the 
country consists. 
2. “ On the Structure and Affinities of the Genus Siphonia.” By 
W. J. Sollas, Esq., B.A., F.G.S. 
This paper contained, first, a full account of the history of the 
genus Siphonia, including a complete list of its described species, 
and, next, a description of its general and minute structure. Its 
skeletal network was shown to consist of spicular elements belonging 
to the Lithistid type of sponges, and most closely allied in generic 
details to the recent form Piscodermia polydiscus. Not only in this 
character but in every other, Siphonia was shown to approach Disco- 
derntia so closely as to be almost identical with it. 
