After a term of work extending over nearly half a century, Mr. Howell, the Director of the Geological Survey of Great Britain, has retired from the public service. It is not often that a man who has only just reached the age-limit of 65 is able to look back on such a lengthened period of official work. No member of the Geological Survey has before attained such a record. Even Mr. Selwyn, whose portrait we gave in our February Number, had reached the age of 70 when he had nearly completed his fiftieth year of work on the Geological Surveys of Great Britain, Victoria, and Canada.

The area occupied by Lower Palæozoic rocks in Victoria is an extensive one, and is pretty equally divided between Ordovician and Silurian, the part occupied by Cambrian being small. According to Dr. A. R. C. Selwyn, formerly Director of the Geological Survey of the Colony, the total area amounts to somewhere about 30,000 square miles in extent, and although in this estimate he included all areas occupied by these rocks provided the cover was not more than. 350 feet in thickness, it will still leave us with a large extent of country over which graptolites may be found.

The spine is 40 mm. in length, by 5 mm. in width at the junction _L of the inserted and exserted portions; from this point the spine gradually narrows to a moderately fine point at the apex. The posterior margin is nearly straight, the anterior one gently curved, the curve being more marked distally. The lateral surfaces meet in front at a moderately acute angle, the spine being much laterally compressed. The posterior surface is concave, and each margin is armed with the usual well-marked recurved denticles. The sides of the exserted portion are ornamented with a longitudinal series of ganoine-coated, tuberculated ridges.