284 PRESIDENT OF GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY CHAP, ix 



resigned his appointment in the Survey during the 

 summer of 1863, and it was difficult thereafter to 

 secure his continuous services for the completion of 

 his part of the Memoir. But at last, towards the end 

 of 1865, Ramsay could write and date his preface, and 

 the work was finally issued to the public early in 1866. 

 It was the most detailed piece of writing which the 

 Geological Survey had yet published, and it contained 

 deductions and speculations of the greatest interest in 

 theoretical geology. 



The work of the Royal Commission on Coal, of 

 which Ramsay was an active member, demanded a 

 great deal of time during the five years from 1 866 to 

 1870. Besides the numerous meetings of the Com- 

 mission and of its committees, he undertook much 

 additional labour in preparing, with the help of the 

 staff of the Survey, maps, sections, and other data for 

 the use of the Commissioners. Now and then, how- 

 ever, some less technical application of geology would 

 arise to enliven the routine work of the office, as when 

 Dean Stanley asked whether the geologist could 

 throw any light on the history of the Coronation Stone 

 at Westminster, round which so many old legends 

 hang. Ramsay wrote to me about this request as 

 follows : ' Yesterday I was at Westminster Abbey 

 with the Dean, specially to examine the Coronation 

 Stone from Scone. It is a reddish-grey sandstone, 

 with three pebbles in it, one quartz and two dark ones 

 of a doubtful substance, which may be Lydian stone. 

 It is a hewn stone, with chisel-marks on it, and looks 

 like a stone originally prepared for building purposes. 

 Macculloch says it was taken from Dunstaffnage to 

 Scone by Kenneth II. I see according to your map 

 Dunstaffnage stands on Old Red Sandstone. What is 



