As confirmatory of the Miocene age assigned by me, on other palæontological grounds, to the Tertiary sands on the Southern shores of Victoria, containing the Trigonia semiundulata (M'Coy), I think the accompanying figure (Plate VIII., Fig. 1), of the natural size, of a molar of an Australian species of the mammalian genus Squalodon, may be of interest.

The species is smaller than any of the American Eocene Zeuglodonts, or the Maltese Miocene Squalodon Melitensis, and it differs form them all in the great proportions, length (or depth), and imperfect bifurcation of the root. In the latter, and all other characters, it most nearly agrees with the Squalodon Grateloupi of von Meyer, from the French Miocene beds near Bordeaux.

I owe my acquaintance with this interesting fossil to Mr. S. Stutterd, who kindly forwarded it to me for my inspection. It is from the Stonesfield Slate, and is preserved in limestone, but is only a cast formed in the matrix left in the rock after the organism itself had disappeared. The core had been hollow, or composed of a more speedily perishable material than the parietes, and so it rapidily disappered, permitting the empty axis to be filled with fragments of shells and calcareous sand. Externally, the cylindrical fossil is formed of sub-quadrangular peltate plates, with irregular undulate dentate margins, the projections of each of which fit into the undulations of the surrounding plates, and are arranged in linear series. A transverse section (Plate VIII. Fig. 2b.) shows each of these external plates to be the closed termination of a short tube, that has in the transverse section a hexagonal form. These tubes are filled in with a darker material, which, unfortunately, is without structure, and any determination of the affinities of the fossil must depend entirely on the external form, and the arrangement of the parts. Of necessity, these are defective and unsatisfactory materials; nevertheless, the fossil seems to me to present so remarkable an appearance, and so close an approximation to a portion of the inflorescence of an Aroideous plant, that I do not hesitate to refer it to this family; and I entertain the hope that one result of this notice and the accompanying figure may be to draw some attention to the fossil, which seems to be by no means rare, and so supply the means for more completely establishing its affinities.

This well known genus of Old Red Sandstone Fishes was first named and described by Agassiz in his great work, the “Poissons Fossiles,” vol. ii. page 128. It is there classed with the Acanthodean family, which it somewhat resembles in the character and structure of its small rhomboidal scales; and also (according to Agassiz), in possessing Branchiostegal rays. This characteristic, however, as will afterwards be shown, appears to me to be founded on a misapprehension of the true nature of a series of elongated plates, situated below the lower jaw, which seem peculiar to this genus. The many points in which it very widely differs from the Acanthodeans induced the late Hugh Miller to suggest its removal altogether from them; and a distinct family, which he names Cheirolepini, is formed for its reception by Pander.

The specimen which I intend briefly to notice was obtained by Dr. Grindrod, of Malvern, about two years since, from the red, compact Sandstones, immediately resting on the grey ‘Passage-beds’ at Ledbury. Dr. Grindrod has kindly lent it to me for description.

The Geology of South Bedfordshire is now being exhibited more fully than hitherto, as the extension of the Midland Railway from Bedford to London is opening up a series of sections in the newer Seconday rocks which characterise this part of the county. The following notes were chiefly taken during a walk made last summer along the line, between the towns of Bedford and St. Alban's (Herts). For the first few miles the excavations are slight, and exhibit only the Drift sands and gravels of the rich valley of the Ouse, though these are well worthy of careful examination for flint implements and mammalian remains, which have been discovered on the north side of the river, at Biddenham, by J. Wyatt, Esq. About three miles from Bedford is an excavation in the Oxford clay; the upper portion is dark brown merging into dark blue beneath, and it abounds in fossil wood in various stages of carbonization, the colour of which ranges from brown to jet black; it is so abundant in places that some of the excavators fancied they were coming upon a coal-mine.

The principal object of a paper which I read at the British Association was to point out the connection between an ancient river running on the Continent, in the direction of the Rhine, and the estuarine deposit of the Forest bed, on the eastern coast of this country. Many geologists have maintained that such a river ran from south to north, which would be in the direction of the Straits of Dover. In proof of the correctness of this supposition, I mentioned that numerous vertebræ of whales had been found in the estuary, which indicated an opening to the sea, and also arctic shells, which indicated a northerly direction; at the same time that the immigration of elephants and other animals proved the junction of this country with the Continent.