14 NOTES AND COMMENTS [ January 



Mr. Holland's memoir is a remarkably complete and thorough 

 piece of work, and we hope that the Director of the Geological Survey 

 of India will be able to issue a number of monographs worthy of 

 association with this the first of the series. 



Abstracts of Papers before reading. 



It is a frequent complaint that the title of a paper to be read before 

 a society, as issued in the circular convening the meeting, affords but 

 little clue to the subject matter. This not infrequently keeps away 

 many who, did they know the subject of the paper, would endeavour 

 to attend and help forward a discussion. Some societies make it a 

 rule to print the paper in advance, and circulate the full paper, or an 

 abstract, to those likely to be interested in the subject, and these 

 societies invariably secure a good discussion, at once useful to the 

 author and to the society. We are glad to note that in the circular 

 issued by the Geologists' Association of London for their December 

 meeting, this course has been followed for the first time. The paper 

 is entitled Contributions to the Geology of the Thames Valley, by A. M. 

 Davies, and the abstract of contents of the paper, no doubt supplied by 

 Mr. Davies, is as follows : — 



This is a stratigraphical paper dealing mainly with the beds within the 

 Kimeridge Clay and the Gault in Bucks and Oxon. The most important new 

 observations recorded are (i.) the Presence of Purbeck Beds N. of Haddenham 

 and INT. of Towersey ; (ii.) the Non-existence of the Gault Outlier mapped N.E. 

 of Haddenham ; (iii.) the Presence of Portlandian Beds between the Shotover 

 Ironsands and Kimeridge Clay at Littleworth, near Wheatley. The Author 

 will exhibit maps, sections and specimens, and Mr. J. H. Pledge will exhibit 

 photographs in illustration of the paper. 



It is often quite impossible for an author to describe his paper in 

 his title, though such a course is obviously to be desired, and we hope 

 the Association will see its way to continue the abstracts, whenever 

 such a course seems desirable to the Secretary. There are many other 

 societies which might well follow suit. 



A Slight Misunderstanding. 



In a recently published volume on " Degeneracy " (Contemporary Science 

 Series, 1898), of which we shall have more to say afterwards, Dr. 

 E. S. Talbot says that "Weismaun has practically abandoned the 

 essential basis of his position by admitting that maternal nutrition 

 may play a part in determining variation. He now asserts that the 

 origin of a variation is equally independent of selection and amphi- 

 mixis, and is due to the constant occurrence of slight inequalities of 

 nutrition in the germ-plasm. As acquired characters affecting the 

 constitution of the parents are certain to affect the nutrition of the 

 germ-plasm, it is therefore obvious, according to Weismann's admission, 



