THE BLOSSOMING OF THE TREES. 
67 
The Alder prefers to grow by the banks of streams, but does well 
on rocky ground. Its cone-like fruits are persistent, often remaining 
attached to the tree until the next season’s flowers are well develoj)ed. 
The Hazel is rarely more than a bush. Towards the end of 
February the deciduous yellow catkins, composed of tiny flowers, each 
with' eight stamens, sheltered by tufts of hairs and a single bract, 
and the crimson stigmas of the immature nuts are very noticeable. 
The Willow tribe is a large one, with about eighty varieties — 
invariably dioecious. The catkins of some, chiefly Salix Caprea and 
S. cinerea, are attractive at the end of March with showy masses of 
stamens and silky greyish hairs. The flowering branches do service 
as “palms” on Palm Sunday. 
The seeds of both Poplars and Willows have at their base a fringe 
of flne hairs by means of which the wind carries them long distances. 
The Silver Birch, the two varieties of Oak, and the Beech are 
amongst the catkin-bearing trees, whilst the Sycamore and Maple 
bear their yellowish green flowers of both sexes in drooping racemes. 
The Apple is the only British tree to possess a coloured corolla, 
the other fruit trees and the Hawthorn have white petals. In the 
structure of their fruits these trees present some special points of 
interest that illustrate the characters of the great sub-division 
(Calycijiorce) to which they belong. 
IPb^sical 2>istiu'bance6 in tbe Somerset anb 
(Bloucestersbire Coalfielb. 
(Abstract of Paper by J. McMurtrie, F.G.S., read on Nov. 5th.) 
M b. McMUBTBIE briefly referred to the various exposures of the 
Palteozoic rocks which surrounded the coalfield, dealing first of 
all with the Mendip range and its far-reaching extensions to Pem- 
broke on the one hand, and the Continental coalfields on the other. 
Passing on to Broadfield Down and the exposures of the older rocks 
northwards, he pointed out how the coalfield had thus been sur- 
rounded as by a ring fence on its southern, western, and northern 
margins, while certain isolated areas of Mountain Limestone at Doynton, 
Wick, and Beech, served as boundary stones to indicate its eastern border. 
With the help of numerous diagrams he then described the sectional 
structure of the district, with its overlying formations from the Great 
Oolite down to the New Bed Sandstone, the Coal measures, with their 
three-fold division into upper Coal measures. Pennant rock, and lower 
division, together with the older rocks which underlie them, including 
the Millstone grit. Mountain Limestone, and Old Bed Sandstone, to 
which Professor Beynolds had added the Silurian, which he had lately 
discovered on the Mendip Hills. The overlying formations, with their 
