NOTES—ORIGINAL AND SELECTED.
45
superior, for its edible qualities, to the common mushroom. The
individual in question measured fifty-one inches in circum-
ference, which would be equivalent to a diameter of seventeen
inches, and its weight was over three pounds. It is not un-
common during a wet season to meet with specimens twelve
inches in diameter, and even more, but I should consider the
above to be abnormally large. Rather a full dish or a bachelor's
breakfast.—M. C. Cooke, LL.D., A.L.S., Sept. 1st, 1902.
Fungoid Disease in Hornbeams.—In continuation of my
paper " An enquiry into the cause of the Death of Birch trees
in Epping Forest and elsewhere " (Essex Nat., vol. xi., pp.
273-284), I may mention that on several occasions this autumn,
while making further notes on the progress of the disease that
has destroyed so many birch trees, I have noticed several Horn-
beams either partly dead, or quite so, in many parts of the Forest;
notably in Lord's Bushes, Rushy Plain, Gilbert's Slade, and Bury
Wood. At first it seemed probable that death might be due
simply to old age, but on closer observations, young trees were
found to have suffered as well as the old ones. In some cases,
death has occurred since the formation of the fruit this summer.
All the dead branches that have been examined, exhibit the
hyphal threads of a fungus under the bark. The fungus most
common on many of trees was Corticium comedens.—Robert
Paulson, October, 1902.
GEOLOGY.
East Anglian Tertiary Geology.—Our readers should
have their attention called to "A Sketch of the Later Tertiary
History of East Anglia," by W. F. Harmer, F.G.S., Proceedings
Geologists' Association, Vol. xvii.., Aug. and Nov., 1902 (Stanford,
1s. 6d.). Mr. Harmer's "Sketch" (pp. 416-479) is well illustrated
by maps and sections; one map showing the distribution of the
Crag around Walton-on-Naze and Harwich. The paper is so
full of detail that it hardly admits of an abstract, but it will be
found a very valuable one to Essex geologists. Mr. Harmer has
been working at the geology of the Eastern Counties for 30 or 40
years. An account of the Excursion of the Association to Suffolk
and Norfolk (July 26th to August 5th, 1902) follows in the same
part, pp. 480-488. Walton was visited on July 28th. The
reports will well repay perusal.