19 



which the powers of nature may be subjugated to the powers of man in his 

 ceaseless struggle with her material elements. Scientific researches into the 

 constitution of things which by the ignorant are too often assumed to be useless 

 in their application to the practical affairs of life, are by the intelligent now 

 appreciated as honest efforts to add to the sura of verified facts, which are of the 

 highest value, not only as truth, but also as disconnected links which may at any 

 moment be connected by others and produce practical good. Medical science 

 furnishes numberless examples, particularly in the history of Zymotic and other 

 microscopic diseases. 



The scientific genius of the age, too, has responded to this demand for tan- 

 gible results. Students have ceased to speculate upon unsubstantial theories, 

 and no longer spend their lives in search of the " Philosopher's stone " or th^ 

 *' Elixir of Liife." Science is no longer a lifeless abstraction floating above the 

 beads of the multitude. It has descended to earth and mingles with men. The 

 history ot modern times is full of instances ot this. It is by a knowledge of 

 science that we are able to seek out and detect the mineral treasures embowelled 

 in our mountains ; by the same power we are enabled to dissolve from their 

 stony beds the organic remains of former ages and re-use them to fertilize again 

 our fields. It teaches us how to combine elements which separate are inert and 

 harmless, but which united can in a moment of time demolish structures which 

 have taken years to build. In the art of photography it has given to man the 

 sunbeam as a pencil infallible in the accuracy of its delineation, and in the 

 electric telegraph it has given him the lightning of the clouds as a messenger. 



The powers and benefits bestowed upon man by science are so numerous 

 that no one now dares to speak slightingly of her. The hidden forces of nature, 

 the laws by which her phenomena are governed in all their variety and succes- 

 sion, everything is undergoing a rigorous scientific investigation from which 

 result discuveries that would be deemed simply miraculous did not their number 

 and frequency almost exhaust our faculty of wonder. 



REPORT OF THE GEOLOGICAL BRANCH 



J^or the Seaso7i of 1881. 



To the Council of the Ottaioa Field-Naturalistis Club: 



The leaders of the Geological Branch of the Clnb, in presenting this, tlieir 

 first annual report on the proceedings of that division of tbe Club for the field 

 season of 1881, regret that, owing chiefly to the small number of members inter- 

 ested in geology, it was found impossible to carry out the intention of the 

 Council to organize working parties, or to hold periodical short excursions of the 

 branch ; and consequent!}' the work accomplished has been by members indi- 

 -vidually, and almost wholly in the paheontological section. 



