OBITUARY. 
KARL AUGUST LOSSEN. 
Diep FEBRUARY 24, 1893. 
CIENCE has sustained a severe loss in the death, on February 
24, of Dr. Karl August Lossen, Professor of Geology at the 
School of Mines and at the University of Berlin, and chief Geologist 
of the Prussian Survey. 
Dr. Lossen was an enthusiastic field geologist and an able 
petrologist. Most of his work was done in the Hartz, and his well- 
known map of that district is remarkable both for its accuracy and 
for the minuteness of the detail. He was one of the first to establish 
the immense importance of dynamic agencies in modifying the 
structure and composition of both igneous and sedimentary rocks, 
and he clearly recognised that the principles which he had established 
by detailed work in his own area were applicable to all parts of the 
Hercynian range in its course through Europe, from the West of 
England to the Sudetes. His early papers will be found in the 
Zertschift der deutschen geologischen Gesellschaft, between the years 1864 
and 1880. His later and, in some respects, most important work was 
published in the Fahrbuch dey kiniglich pvreussichen geologischen Lan- 
desanstalt, and in the detailed memoirs on the separate sheets issued 
by the Prussian Geological Survey (1: 25,000). 
The great importance of his work has failed to attract the general 
attention which it deserves in consequence of his extremely involved 
literary style—a style which was probably due in part to his unfortu- 
nate deafness. All those who had the good fortune to meet him 
speak with enthusiasm of his charming personal character, and of 
his extreme readiness to communicate any information which he 
possessed. He was a Foreign Correspondent of the Geological 
Society of London. 
E have also to announce the death of Professor Schaaffhausen, 
of Bonn, whose name was prominently before the scientific 
world some thirty years ago in connection with the famous Neander- 
thal Skull. In 1880 he visited this country, bringing with him the 
original skull, which he exhibited and described at the Swansea 
meeting of the British Association. He was born in 1816. 
