Norfolk.—The so-called Red Chalk is visible in two quarries at Snettisham, but the exposures there are less favourable for investigation than the well-known section to be seen in the cliff north of Hunstanton. The thin rock-bands there comprised under this title have given rise to much discussion amongst geologists, whose views have been summarized by Mr. W. Whitaker and by the late A. J. Jukes-Browne. The Red Rook, not more than 4 feet thick at this locality, has been variously referred by different authors to the whole Gault formation, to the Upper Gault, to the Upper Greensand, and to the Lower Chalk. So long ago as 1869, the Rev. T. Wiltshire published an illuminating paper in which he described the characters of the three beds that can be recognized as composing the red band. Chiefly on the basis of the fossils found in the two lower beds he made a correlation with the Upper Gault of Folkestone. The late Professor Judd and Professor C. Barrois emphasized the fact that the Red Rock is unconformable with the underlying Greensand, but conformable with the overlying Chalk. Professor Barrois was so impressed by this fact and by the unequivocal character of the fauna that he correlated the red beds with his zone of Ammonites inflatus (Upper Gault).

Portuguese Nyasaland is the name given to the most northern part of Portuguese East Africa, lying between Lake Nyasa and the Indian Ocean. It is separated from the Tanganyika territory in the north by the River Rovuma and from the Portuguese province of Mozambique in the south by the River Lurio. The territory measures about 400 miles from east to west and 200 miles from north to south and has an area of nearly 90,000 square miles. This territory is now perhaps the least known part of the once Dark Continent, but while the writer was actually engaged in the exploration of this country in 1920–1, the Naval Intelligence Division of the British Admiralty published two handbooks, the Manual of Portuguese East Africa and the Handbook of Portuguese Nyasaland, which with their extensive bibliographies contained practically everything that was known of that country up to that date (1920). These handbooks make it unnecessary in this paper to give detailed accounts of the work of previous explorers.

Liassic Irregular Echinoids are rare. The interest attaching to them is exceptionally great, and is enhanced by this rarity. Separation of Exocyclic from Endocyclic types can hardly have preceded the Rhaetic period; hence each Irregular form found in the Lias might be expected to display evidence as to the origin of its sub-class. It cannot be claimed that the few such genera known fulfil expectation. Plesiechinus (represented by P. reynesi) occurs in the “Charmouthian”; it is but little removed from “Regularity”, but the Bajocian species P. ornatus (whieh is locally abundant) seems “just as good” in that respect. Holectypus appears in the Toarcian with H. conquensis; its occurrence at this horizon gives a striking illustration of morphogenetic acceleration, and there by negation to hopes of “genealogical” evidence. Species of Galeropygus are recorded from the Upper Lias; orthodoxy would probably repeat the preceding sentence here, but vide infra. The case of Collyrites, recorded from deposits of Liassic age, must surely be compared with that of Holeclypus; for every feature of the Collyritidae is in violent contrast with “Regular” structures.

The great winged man-lions from Mesopotamia are some of the most conspicuous and most wonderful objects in the British Museum. When visiting that museum last September I was greatly interested as a geologist in examining the kind of rock of which they are composed. This rock is, I suppose, usually taken to be a granite, but it is not an igneous rock. On the contrary, it is of sedimentary origin, a felspathic sandstone (arkose or sparagmite) of very coarse grain, almost bordering on a conglomerate. In the most characteristic variety, from the palace of Sargon, the chief constituentis white quartz in lumps varying in size between that of a hazel-nut and an apple (see Fig. 1). These are embedded in a cement of coarse-grained sparagmite. A notable peculiarity is thatthe fragments of quartz have very irregular contours, giving the appearance of an invasion of the larger fragments by the groundmass. In other varieties (Palace of Assurbanipal) the fragments of quartz are smaller and may in some cases show no distinction from the quartz-grains of the groundmass.

During part of the year 1920–1 the much-discussed “Middle Headon Marine” bed was again exposed in the cliffs near Milford, in such a position that there could be no doubt of its being truly in situ. No records on this subject have appeared for nearly forty years; and the recent exposure has given an opportunity of verifying the observations of earlier writers, and of explaining the discrepancies which occur in their several accounts.