BEEKITE. 
15 
Also reported as occurring in the Carboniferous of Scotland and 
Flintshire, in the Trias of Jersey, and in the Chalk and Norwich 
Crag of Norfolk. To this may be added a few of the foreign 
localities reported by various writers, showing how wide is the 
range (the formations are given where mentioned, but many have 
omitted them) ; Cretaceous : Basses-Alpes, Mecklenburg, and near 
Geneva. Corallian : Wurtemburg. Oxfordian : Ardennes, also 
Vallecas (near Madrid), Island of Haro (Norway), Mantua Downs 
(Queensland), Rhodesia, Punjab (Hindostan), Connecticut Valley, 
and Clarke County (Indiana). 
There is but little doubt that both the home and foreign lists 
could be indefinitely extended, but the localities named are ample 
to dispose of the idea that it is at all limited in occurrence either 
geographically or stratigraphically. 
As to the fossils affected, a few important points have been 
noted, one of which is, that different organisms are not equally 
liable — in other words some are very susceptible to Beekite, while 
others, in the same zone, seem to be practically or entirely immune. 
The organisms which are the chief sufferers are as follows : — Corals, 
Stromatoporids, Sponges, some Brachiopods (especially Spirifer, 
Productus, Terebratula, and Rhynchonella), Lamellibranchs (such 
as Pecten, Lima, Ostroea, &c.), a few Gasteropods (Murchisonia, 
&c.), and nearly all the Encrinites. 
Coming to those apparently immune we have not as yet found 
it on any of the following, with the few exceptions specified — 
Crustacea, Echinodermata, Cephalopoda (with a few exceptions in 
Orthoceras and Belemnites), Brachiopods (except those already 
mentioned). 
It has been suggested that this liability or immunity might be 
due to the nature of the shell or skeleton, some being composed 
of Calcite, and others of Aragonite. Dr. H. C. Sorby, in his 
Presidential Address to the Geological Society, enters into the 
subject of the microscopical structure of shells, &c., and classifies 
them as follows — Corals, all Aragonite ; Lamellibranchs and 
Gasteropods — mostly Aragonite, except Ostroea and Pecten, which 
are Calcite ; Cephalopods — mostly Aragonite ; Crinoids, Echino- 
derms, and Brachiopods— nearly all Calcite.* 
It will be seen from the foregoing that the list of those liable 
to, or immune from Beekite, does not agree in many points with 
Dr. Sorby’s classification — as Ostroea, Pecten, and certain Brachio- 
pods, which he states have Calcite shells, are frequently Beekised — 
and sometimes heavily. This matter is, however, being looked 
into by Mr. James Strachan (Belfast Field Club). It is a slow 
process, requiring great patience and careful observation, and may 
therefore require some time before any definite report is made. 
Quart. Jour. Geol. Soc., Vol. XXXV., 1879. 
