33Q NATURAL SCIENCE. Nov., 



In our last number we briefly drew attention to the stirring 

 address by Mr. Teall on Uniformitarianism : an antidote has already 

 been provided. 



In an article on " The Position of Geology" (Nineteenth Century, 

 October), Professor Prestwich offers a vigorous protest against " the 

 dwarfing influence of Uniformitarianism.'" He admits that the forces 

 acting upon the surface of the globe in past times have remained the 

 same in kind; but he strongly opposes the notion that they have 

 remained the same in degree. "What (he asks) if it were suggested 

 that the brick-built Pyramid of Hawara had been laid brick by brick 

 by a single workman ? Given time, this would not be beyond the 

 bounds of possibility. But Nature, like the Pharaohs, had greater 

 forces at her command to do the work better and more expeditiously 

 than is admitted by Uniformitarians." Professor Prestwich com- 

 plains, and we think rightly, that many arguments with regard to 

 geological time and the rate of denudation are based on very 

 limited evidence ; they furnish standards applicable to present 

 changes, but they give no measure of the amount and rate of work 

 that could be done. We must interpret phenomena by the light of 

 the facts themselves. Those who claim vast periods of time for the 

 Glacial and post-Glacial periods, give no explanation why such 

 animals as the Reindeer, the Musk-ox, and the Glutton survive 

 unchanged. He concludes that Uniformitarian measures of time 

 " have probably done more to impede the exercise of free inquiry and 

 discussion than any of the catastrophic theories which formerly 

 prevailed " ; they " hedge us in by dogmas which forbid any interpre- 

 tation of the phenomena other than that of fixed rules which are 

 more worthy of the sixteenth than of the nineteenth century." 



" The Work of the Geological Survey" forms the title of a 

 paper read, by Sir Archibald Geikie, before the Federated Institution 

 of Mining Engineers (Transactions, vol. v., p. 142). After a short 

 sketch of some early geological maps, the writer gives an account 

 of the method of mapping, and of the various kinds of map issued 

 by the Geological Survey. Other branches of the Survey work are 

 dealt with, and it is stated in conclusion that " From the beginning 

 of its existence the Survey has been continually referred to by all 

 branches of the Government Service ' for information regarding 

 questions in which a knowledge of geology is required. The sinking 

 of wells, the choice of sites for forts and Government buildings, the 

 placing of graveyards, the selection of materials for buildings or 

 roads, the nature of soils and subsoils, with reference to matters of 

 drainage — these and many other subjects have been reported on. 

 Nor has the general public been backward in application for similar 

 information. The offices of the Survey are always open, and every 

 assistance which can be rendered to enquirers is placed freely at 

 their service." 



