GLEANINGS-KEPOKTS 
95 
Marine Excursion. —The Birraincjham Natural History and Micro- 
scopical Society have resolved to have a second Marine Excursion at 
Oban this summer. The great success of the last excursion to this 
charming and salubrious part of Scotland, coupled with the fact that 
Mr. W. P. Marshall, M.I.C.E., and Prof. A. Milnes Marshall (who 
recently obtained the Darwin Prize awarded to Biology by tlie Midland 
Union) have still to determine some important points connected with 
the Pennatulida, have influenced the Committee in this decision. The 
time fixed for the Excursion is from Friday evening, 29th June, to 
Tuesday, 10th July. Committees have been appointed for Transport 
and Commissariat and Dredging arrangements. Information about 
the Excursion may be obtained from Mr. John Morley, Hon. Sec. to 
the Society, Sherborne Road, Balsall Heath, Birmingham. 
BIRMINGHAM NATURAL HISTORY AND MICROSCOPICAL SOCIETY.— 
GeologicaXi Section. —February 27tli. — Mr. W. J. Harrison, F.G.S., was re¬ 
elected chairman, and Mr. A. H. Atkins, B.Sc., secretary for the ensuing year. Dr. 
H. W. Crosskey read a very interesting paper on “ Recent Investigations in the 
Glacial Geology of the Midlands.” He described three localities where he had 
found remarkable traces of glacial action. The first was a section in the Lias 
at Stockton, near Rugby, where a mass of boulder clay overlies a Lias bed. The 
clay is much contorted, and contains fragments of millstone grit, quartzite, 
granite, flints, and striated Lias pebbles. The second locality was at Mochas 
Bay, near Barmouth, where a large number of angular boulders, derived from 
the neighbouring mountains, are found on the sea coast near the water. Above 
these, nearer the shore, is found a bed entirely composed of shells and frag¬ 
ments of shells and rock, and this in turn is succeeded by the ordinary sea¬ 
shore sand. This section indicates glacial conditions, followed by a subsidence 
of the land, when a varied molluscan fauna abounded in the bays and estuaries. 
This was succeeded by an elevation, and the accumulation of sand which is 
going on now. The third phenomenon described was a curious series of striated 
and polished blocks of basalt, or Rowley Rag, found in some clay beds on the 
Rowley Hills, which apparently could not have been so acted on except 
by ice action. He thought that it was quite possible that about the time 
of the Glacial epoch the Rowley Hills and other similar elevations might 
have been islands in the Glacial Sea, and that the comparatively small 
ice masses on them might have caused the effects mentioned. 
Biological Section, March 6th.—Mr. J. E. Bagnall exhibited Bicranum 
montanum (new to Worcestershire!, Br'ijum roseimi and Leucobryum glaucnm, 
from Shrawley Wood; Taryionia hypophylla, and Kantia arguta, from 
Habberley Valley; and TJsnea hirta and BcBomycea rufus, from Shrawley and 
Stourport. Mr. T. Bolton exhibited Hemidiniutn nasuium, an Infusorian which 
he discovered, for the first time in Britain, in Sutton Park last month. It some¬ 
what resembles Peiidinium tabulaturn, but is only half as large, and the 
equatorial groove extends only half-way round the body. It is described in 
Stein’s recently published volume. Mr. W. B. Grove exhibited the following 
fungi:— Sphcsria aquila, Hypomyces aurcmtius, and Trichia chrysosperma, from 
Sutton; Sphceria pulvis-vyrius, and Diatrype stigma, from Ufi'moor Wood, 
Halesowen; and a remarkably large specimen of Polyporus betulinus, from 
Harborne, measuring thirteen inches across, and six inches thick. Mr. W. 
Greatheed then read a paper entitled “An Evolutionist’s Notes on Transmi¬ 
gration,” in which he showed how our predecessors had a glimpse of one of the 
truths of evolution as revealed by Darwin, namely, heredity. He began with a 
quotation from Plato, in which Socrates clearly set forth the view that the 
