1865.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 351 



general groups of the Silurian, Devonian, and Carboniferous are 

 thoroughly recognized by him and his associates according to the 

 divisions established in Britain, and of which our father William 

 Smith set the first example, by his admirable identification of the 

 strata of the Secondary rocks by their fossils and order of super- 

 position. 



My veteran German friend is accompanied by another of his 

 countrymen, Professor Ferdinand of Roemer, of Breslau, whose 

 works have justly earned for him a very high position, particu- 

 larly in palaeontology ; and whilst one of these is upon Texas, in 

 the United States of America, let me say how fortunate we are in 

 having among us Principal Dawson, of Montreal, in Canada, 

 whose merits are so well known to every reader of the volumes of 

 Lyell and the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of Lon- 

 don. There may indeed be present several distinguished visitors 

 from distant countries, with whose arrival or intention of coming 

 hither I am unacquainted whilst I write ; but in relation to our 

 nearest neighbors, the French, it gave me great pleasure when I 

 learned that our y°unger Foreign Associates were to be led by M. 

 A. Gaudry, once Preside it of the Geological Society of France. 

 Now, all these visitors will, I doubt not, rejoice in having the 

 opportunity of studying the varied relations of the sedimentary 

 and eruptive rocks in the vicinity of this flourishing hive of 

 human industry. These and other foreign visitors, as well as our 

 associates from different parts of the United Kingdom, will neces- 

 sarily take a deep interest in comparing the varied rocks and their 

 fossils, which are grouped around our place of meeting, with the 

 sedimentary and eruptive rocks of their own several districts. 



Among the recent important additions to our knowledge of the 

 geographical distribution and characters of the Silurian rocks, I 

 cannot but advert to the successful labors of Professor Harkness. 

 He had already shown in the clearest manner, by the evidence of 

 fossils and order of succession, that the lowest of the strata in the 

 Cambrian district of the Lakes, the slates of Skiddaw, are truly of 

 Lower Silurian age, and not older than the Llandeilo group. 

 Recently, in pursuing his labors, he has detected fossils in the 

 " green slates " or volcanic ashes and porphyries which lie inter- 

 mediate between the Skiddaw strata and the higher Silurian ; 

 and he has further found others in the Coniston Flags, which he 

 views as equivalents of the upper part of the Caradoc formation. 

 Further, Professor Harkness has shown, for the first time, that 



