In opposition to the views enunciated by Lyell and the older geologists, and until now generally accepted by those who have made physical geology a study, an opinion is gaining ground that “generally speaking the great continents and great ocean basins have occupied their present positions through all geological time;” that they are, though subject to oscillations of level, permanent depressions and elevations produced by the gradual diminution of the earth's diameter through loss of heat and consequent sinking in of the rigid crust.

It is not proposed to discuss the merits of the generic name applied to a group of Univalves so characteristic of and so abundant in the Jurassic rocks. Melania, Eulima, and Chemnitzia have each of them served in turn, and in adopting Chemnitzia after D'Orbigny, the late Dr. S. P. Woodward observed that the “Melaniœ” of the Secondary rocks are provisionally referred to this genus. Pictet and Campiche include the Chemnitziœ and Phasianellœ of the Oolites in one genus Psendomelania, thus preserving to a certain extent the old generic appellation.

For many years past I have been familiar with the Trias of Staffordshire, but of late I have been noticing more carefully, during my occasional visits to that county, the pebbles in the Bunter, in the hope of being able to identify the parent rocks from which they have been derived. It has already been regarded as almost certain that many of them have a northern origin: and with, this idea in view I observed last summer the lithological character of the quartzites near Loch Maree. Although the results at which I have arrived are very incomplete, I think more good will be done by publishing them than by waiting, because, as it seems to me, they settle one or two points of importance, and because a question, like that of the origin of the pebbles in a deposit so widely spread as the Bunter, is one which can be better determined by a number of observers living in different localities than by any one person, especially if, like myself, he has but little time to spare for the investigation. If, however, I can show that one or two points may be regarded as fairly certain, it will very much facilitate the work of such observers. This work, the careful scrutiny of the contents of conglomerates, is one of more importance than may at first sight appear, because a rock fragment no less, and sometimes more, than a fossil records certain facts in the physical geography of the deposit in which it is found.

The overlapping of the sciences is made the subject of much rhetorical writing now-a-days, and its appreciation is one of the most prominent signs of the modern development of the doctrine of Continuity which has been so fruitful in the Philosophy of Discovery. The boundary-line which once separated the geologist and ethnologist has in consequence of this development entirely disappeared, and every one now admits as a postulate that between the two sciences there is a stretch of neutral ground belonging to neither exclusively, and where the students of each must of necessity reap if their harvest is to be complete. Not only so, but it is beginning to be seen that the methods and the directions of the arguments in each science being more or less different—the one partaking much more of the historical, and the other of the experimental method—that it is well that where they overlap the results of each should be closely compared, and thus not only secure a double modicum of certitude, but also suggest fresh veins of untried material where we may put in our mattock with renewed hope of solving some apparently hopeless problems.

It has often appeared to me that in working out the ancient physical features of the earth in former periods of its history, too little attention has been given to one simple set of evidences which are of wide-spread occurrence, and, frequently, of very clear and decided meaning. I refer to the included rock-fragments of conglomeratic deposits. An appeal to these fragments would, I believe, often bring out clearly-written facts of no small value for the elucidation of the nature of ancient sea-margins, as compared with the much-involved palæontological evidences with which we are made so much more familiar.

Having been favoured by Mr. T. M. Quill, who has of late successfully completed an artesian well at Wokingham, with opportunities of examining the specimens brought up from the well, and with his own notes on the progress and results of the boring, I have drawn up a tabular statement of the strata pierced on that occasion. The well was begun in May, 1879, in the London Clay, on the low ground at the foot of the hill of Bagshot Sand on which Wokingham stands, near the junction of the S.W. and S.E. Eailways. A 6-foot shaft was sunk for 264 feet, penetrating the London Clay; a 24-inch pipe, through 6½ feet of sand and clay of the “Basement Bed,” then reached a water-bearing sand of the same series; and a pipe (16-inch) and bore-hole were continued for 138 feet, down to 408 feet, at a level of 64 feet in the Chalk, where an abundant supply of water was obtained.

In some notes communicated to the GeologicalMagazine last April (p. 152), attention was called to the fact that remains of the Glutton had been recently obtained from the “Forest Bed.” So much interest is attached to the discovery of an animal, which at the present day is restricted to the cold northern regions, along with Elephant and other remains, which seem to indicate a warm climate, that it has been thought desirable to give some account of the discovery. I am indebted to Mr. R. Fitch, of Norwich, to whom the specimen belongs, for his courtesy in submitting it to me for examination. It is a portion of a lower jaw with teeth, of a Glutton, Gulo luscus, Linn., a genus which, although known to occur in the fossil state, has hitherto only been obtained from Cave deposits.

In Mr. W. H. Dalton's letter on “Post-Glacial,” in July No., p. 333, line 11 from foot, for “Further deposits,” read “Further, these deposits.”