290 Geological Society. 



great theoretical and practical questions throw no common difficul- 

 ties in the way of a person who is beginning the study of Geology : 

 and it is especially on this account, that I regard the " Sections 

 and Views illustrative of Geological Phenomena," recently published 

 by Mr. de la Beche, as a compendium, excellently fitted to assist the 

 progress of our science. 



Before finally quitting the subject of British secondary formations, 

 I must mention a communication by Mr. Sharpe, describing a speci- 

 men of an Ichthyosaurus found in the lias near Stratford-upon-Avon. 

 From the proportions of the vertebrae, the size of the paddle, and 

 the circular or oval form of its component bones, as well as from 

 other anatomical peculiarities, the author concludes, that this ani- 

 mal belongs to a new species, for which he proposes the name of 

 Ichthyosaurus grandipes. 



Facts illustrating the structure of distant regions of the earth 

 have their value greatly enhanced by the difficulty of obtaining 

 them. Every gleaning of information on the physical history of Aus- 

 tralia or the Isles of the Pacific, will be received in this Society with 

 the deepest interest. I will not, however, detain you with any ana- 

 lysis of the paper by Mr. Cunningham on the Geology of Hunter's 

 River in New South Wales, and that by Mr. Caldcleugh on the 

 Physical Structure of the Island of Juan Fernandez, as the im- 

 portant parts of their contents must be still fresh in your recollec- 

 tion, and they offer no materials from which I can draw any general, 

 theoretical conclusions. 



Connected with the primary and secondary formations of Conti- 

 nental Europe, several communications have come before the Society. 

 Of these I must first notice two short memoirs, accompanying geo- 

 logical maps of Moravia and Transylvania, by Doctor Boue' j and a 

 longer and more elaborate memoir, by the same author, explanatory 

 of a geological map of Austria and Southern Bavaria. I need not 

 inform the gentlemen whom I am addressing that this indefatigable 

 observer has spent many years of his life in disentangling the com- 

 plex phenomena of the Alps that he has extended his surveys 

 through Moravia, and the great Carpathian chain to the province of 

 Transylvania that combining his own observations with those of De 

 Lill, Beudant, and others, who had in part preceded him, he has been 

 enabled to exhibit the geological relations of this vast region, and 

 through the intervention of common deposits to bring it into accord- 

 ance with the system of the Austrian Alps. It is obviously impos- 

 sible for me to offer any analysis of such labours, of which the three 

 maps presented to the Society are most honourable records. 



It would be equally impossible to give, with any effect, an abstract 

 of the several memoirs of Dr. Boue ; for they bring before us so many 

 facts, and in so condensed a form, that they seem to contain mate- 

 rials hereafter to be expanded into works far beyond the limits of any 

 ordinary communication. On these subjects I must therefore be 

 content to refer you to the printed analysis of his papers, and to his 



