May 25, 1857.] ADMIRALTY SURVEYS— BLACK SEA. 403 



peninsula of Kerry, and which, having twice examined myself, I can 

 testify to be the most interesting part of Ireland, in showing certain 

 relations of the Silurian to the Devonian rocks, which can nowhere 

 else be seen in the sister island. 



The neighbourhood of this immediate coast, on the south side of 

 Dingle Bay, is about to become a site of much interest and import- 

 ance, the small island of Valentia having been selected as the Eastern 

 or European terminus of that Atlantic Electric Telegraph Cable, 

 on which I shall presently enlarge, as destined to unite the two 

 continents in stricter bonds of amity and good fellowship. 



It must interest my hearers to know that Lieut. Dayman, r.n., 

 who was a companion of Sir James Eoss in his voyage to the 

 Antarctic regions, will leave England in a few days in command of 

 the Cyclops steamer, to carry a line of deep sea soundings across 

 the Atlantic, from Valentia to Trinity Bay in Newfoundland. The 

 vessel is furnished with some 20,000 fathoms of line of different 

 sizes, a portion being of silk, with an abundant supply of sounding 

 machines, and a steam-engine on deck on purpose to heave in and 

 reel up the line, and we may fairly hope, ere long, to have a second 

 continuous line of soundings across the Atlantic, and know the 

 nature of the bed on which the Telegraph Cable will have to repose. 



With the authority of our Council, I took advantage of the an- 

 nouncement of this expedition, so deeply interesting to naturalists, 

 and suggested to the Hydro grapher that, the opportunity being one 

 which might never recur of obtaining an accurate acquaintance 

 with submarine life at great depths, a competent naturalist might 

 be allowed to accompany the survey, or that in any case the medical 

 officer of the Cyclops might be so instructed as to record accurately 

 the phenomena. 



BlacTi Sea. — In quitting our home for foreign shores, the survey of 

 the Delta of the Danube claims precedence, and is entitled, in the 

 opinion of my eminent friend Captain Washington, to our warmest 

 acknowledgments for the admirable manner in which it has been 

 carried out by Lieut. Wilkinson, r.n., under the orders of Captain 

 Spratt, E.N., C.B., whose report on Fidonisi, or Serpent Island, has 

 been communicated to the Society by the Admiralty. This recent 

 survey of the streams which form the delta of the Danube is com- 

 prised in several charts, filled almost to overflowing with soundings 

 of the three principal branches, Ochakov or Kilia to the north, the 

 Siilina in the centre, and the St. George or Khedriliz to the 

 south. These plans are now lying on the table before us, and 



