10 PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. 



been hidden by sand and shingle. There are stumps of 

 trees embedded in a foot or so of peat covering an old land 

 surface. The description is extremely like that of a similar 

 forest in Swansea Bay which I used to know well, and points 

 to a subsidence of that coast in recent times, as at Swansea 

 the forest remains are chiefly, if not entirely, below high 

 water mark, the shore is very flat, and the tide goes out an 

 immense distance. 



ASTRONOMY. 



I alluded in my last Annual Address to an eclipse of the Sun 

 which had just taken place on Ap. 28, 1911, for which 

 great preparations were made, and which it was hoped 

 might have been successfully observed, but it turned out to 

 be a great disappointment, as the eclipse could hardly be 

 perceived through the clouds which obscured it, and the 

 expedition to the distant island of Vavau was practically 

 a failure. On Ap. 17, 1912, an eclipse of the sun was cal- 

 culated to take place, but it could not be definitely settled 

 w y hether it would be total anywhere or only annular. If 

 total at all it would only be so for a few seconds in some parts 

 of Spain, Portugal, or France. The result appears to have 

 been much in accordance with this, the totality being barely 

 complete anywhere and lasting but a second or two. The 

 British Expedition in Portugal obtained satisfactory obser- 

 vations. In this country it appears to have been watched by 

 almost everyone. No animals, however, seem to have taken 

 any notice of it. We observed particularly that not a single 

 fowl went to roost. The only one to be seen on the perches 

 was a hen which had just laid an egg and was crowing vigor- 

 ously. The fall in temperature, the crescent-shaped images 

 of the sun in the interstices of the foliage shadows and the 

 curious thunderstorm -like appearance of the atmosphere 

 were the most striking effects. One of the most important 

 eclipse investigations is the chemistry of the corona, about 

 which nothing seems to be known. Though photographs 



