Societies and Academies

Abstract

LONDON.Geological Society, June 19.-Dr. Aubrey Strahan, F.R.S., president, in the chair.-R. D. Vernon: The geology and palaeontology of the Warwickshire coalfield. The main objects are to determine the true age of the so-called " Permian " rocks of Warwickshire, and their stratigraphical relationship to the underlying Carboniferous rocks and to the overlying deposits of Triassic age. The Carboniferous rocks are subdivided into groups, and the age of the subdivisions is determined from a study of the fossil flora. On strati-graphical and palaeontological evidence it is shown that a large area of rocks previously mapped as Permian is really Carboniferous. The Carboniferous rocks are subdivided into groups w'hich, on palago-botanical evidence, are proved to belong to the followng three horizons of the Westphalian Series: the Upper Coal Measures, the Transition Measures, and the Middle Coal Measures; the Lower Coal Measures are found to be absent. The fossil flora is described in detail, and a brief account is given of the freshwater and marine faunas of the Middle Coal Measures. The Carboniferous rocks of Warwickshire are correlated with those of the other coalfields of the Midland province, and it can thus be demonstrated that there is a marked southerly attenuation and overlap of each of the subdivisions of the Carboniferous system.-W. H. Hardaker: The discovery of a fossil-bearing horizon in the Permian rocks of Hamstead, near Birmingham. Some quarries in the Permian rocks in the neighbourhood of Hamstead, near Birmingham, have afforded an interesting series of fossils. These consist chiefly of the impressions of plants, and of the footprints of amphibia assignable to several species. The quarries occur in the broad band of strata which is coloured upon the Geological Survey map as Permian, and fringes the eastern side of the South Staffordshire coalfield. The group (and subgroups) in which the fossils occur are described and illustrated in detail, and show that the group as a whole belongs in its lower part to the Midland Middle Permian (or Calcareous Conglomerate and Sandstone) division of Mr. Wickham King, and in its upper part to his Upper Permian (or Breccia and Sandstone) division. Most of the plants and animal footprints discovered belong apparently to recognisable forms which have been long known to occur in the Rothlie-gende (or typical Lower Permian) of Germany, and they have little or no resemblance to those of the undisputed Upper Carboniferous of any known area; and the conclusion is drawn that these fossil-bearing Ham-stead strata must in future be regarded as of Rothlie-gende or true Lower Permian age.