May 25th, 1870.
George Cox Bompas, Esq., 15 Stanley Gardens, Kensington Park, W.; Sir James Anderson, 16 Warrington Crescent, London; and John Breedon Everard, Esq., 6 Millstone Lane, Leicester, were elected Fellows of the Society.
The following communications were read : —
1. Contributions to a knowledge of the Newer Tertiaries of Suffolk and their Fauna. By E. Ray Lankester, B.A. Oxon., Coutts Geological Scholar.
(Communicated by Prof. Huxley, F.R.S., F.G.S.)
[Plates XXXIII. & XXXIV.]
Contents.
1. The bone-bed of Suffolk and stone-bed of Norfolk.
2. The Suffolk box-stones.
3. A new Ziphioid Cetacean from the Suffolk bone-bed.
4. The Trilophodont Mastodon of the Suffolk bone-bed.
5. List of species of terrestrial Mammalia from the Suffolk bone-bed, with reference to the number of specimens and the collections containing them.
6. List of species of Cetaceans and Pinnigradia.
1. The Bone-bed of Suffolk and Stone-bed of Norfolk.
1. A definite step in the progress of the solution of the problem presented to geologists by the confused highly fossiliferous strata of the eastern part of the Eastern Counties has been made, on the one hand, in the recognition of the character of the fauna of the so- called " coprolite-" or bone-bed of Suffolk, as distinct from that of the superposed shelly strata known as Coralline and Red Crags ; and, on the other hand, in regarding the fauna of the Norfolk stone-bed, first recognized by Mr. Gunn, as distinct from that of the superposed shell-beds of the Norwich Crag. The bone-bed underlying the Suffolk Crags and the stone-bed underlying the Norfolk Crags must be looked upon as having a different history and containing a quite distinct fauna from that indicated by the Mollusca of the higher beds, the two not having been contemporaneous, nor related to the same physical conditions. Until quite recently, these two distinct sets of accumulations have been confounded under the common term Crag. It is a matter for regret that the term Crag, locally applied to the shelly strata of the eastern counties, should also have been extended to the whole series of deposits of Antwerp ; for whilst the upper or Yellow Crag, forming the Scaldisien system of Dumont, is clearly equivalent to our Bed and Coralline Crags, the Lower or Black Crag. better called Diestien, is not represented in England by any existing strata in their true position, and is simply connected with the " Crags '*' by a continuity of fauna and succession, which is not so complete as to prevent a very wide and marked gap being observable between the Diestien and Scaldisien periods, — a gap indicating, probably, great change of temperature and the disappearance of remarkable marine mammalia, as well as fishes and mollusca. In England,
