662 



NATURE 



[February io, 19 i6 



scapes that illustrate this memoir are of wide interest 

 and considerable beauty. 



C. H. Clapp has described the south-east of Van- 

 couver Island in Memoir 36 (1913). The interest of 

 the metamorphosed volcanic and sedimentary rocks in 

 this region lies in the fact that they are largely of 

 Lower Mesozoic age, and have been invaded and 

 altered, and in part replaced, by granitic batholites in 

 Upper Jurassic and possibly Lower Cretaceous times. 

 The gneisses thus produced finally offered a denuded 

 surface on which Upper Cretaceous conglomerates 

 have been laid down. The drowned valleys of the 

 Vancouver region are shown to have become elevated 

 by some 250 ft. since a maximum of submergence in 

 early Glacial or Interglacial times (pp. 109 and 127). 

 The topographical and geological maps required for 

 use with this rhemoir are folded in a pocket at the 

 end, in accordance with the present very useful custom 

 of the survey. 



The beautiful country of fiords and islands that 

 results from the subsidence of the Cordilleran coast 

 is dealt with by J. A. Bancroft in Memoir 23 (1913), 

 on "The Coast between the Strait of Georgia and 

 Queen Charlotte Sound, B.C." The Upper Mesozoic 

 intrusions again play a large part, and the relations 

 of the batholites to the roofs above them, and the pro- 

 duction of " roof-pendants," like those studied by C. 

 Darwin in South Africa, can be well seen in the deep 

 sections provided by the fjords (p. 105). An orbicular 

 "hornblende gabbro," which might 'well be called a 

 diorite, occurs in Midsummer Island (p. 94), and is 

 regarded as a product of spherulitic crystallisation 

 ■during the consolidation of the invading magma. 



The remarkable discoveries of silver-cobalt ores at 

 a railway-cutting in Ontario only thirteen years ago 

 led to the rise of the great mining centre of Cobalt. 

 The mineral veins are associated with sills of dolerite 

 (diabase), and the tracing out of the igneous sheets 

 has greatly widened the mining area. W. H. Collins 

 describes the " Gowganda Mining Division," west of 

 Lake Timiskaming, in Memoir 33 (1913). As at 

 Cobalt, the principal ores are native silver, smaltine, 

 nickeline, and copper pyrites. The silver has been 

 deposited as a fine network through the other minerals 

 after their formation. Other memoirs of economic 

 importance are Nos. 47 (1914) and 65 and 66 (1915), 

 on the "Clav and Shale Deposits of the Western 

 Provinces." In these references are required from the 

 plates to the pages of the text. Plate iv. in Memoir 

 65, showing suspended clay in jars, is without any 

 obvious explanation. 



Prof. R. C. Wallace, of the University of Mani- 

 toba, issues a pamphlet through the editorial depart- 

 ment of the Winnipeg Industrial Bureau on "The 

 Geological Formations and Mineral Resources of 

 Manitoba," accompanied by a geological sketch-map. 



Among the separate sheets issued bv the Geological 

 Survey of Canada we may note Map i;3A, described in 

 Memoir 20, covering south-eastern Nova Scotia, on 

 ■the scale of i : 250,000. The foundation-sheet and the 

 colouring may serve as types of the beautiful work 

 produced by the Government departments of the 

 Dominion. 



J. B. Tyrrell (Trans. Royal Soc. Canada, vol. ix., 

 1915, p. 8q) interestingly connects all the gold-bearing 

 veins in the pre-Cambrian rocks of central Canada 

 with the Algoman epoch of igneous intiusion. The 

 albite-diorites which then invaded the pre-Animikiean 

 series seem to have been especially associated with 

 "chrysogenesis." It should be noted that the Algo- 

 man batholites of gneiss and granite are not them- 

 selves rich in gold. The term Huronian is relegated 

 in this paper to rocks above the great unconformity 

 recognised by Logan and Lawson alike. Hence the 

 Algoman epoch is pre-Huronian ; but its rocks are 

 NO. 2415, VOL. 96] 



intrusive in the Timiskaming Series, and the 

 gold veins may occur, therefore, in the older . 

 y Laurentian " gneisses and in the Keewatin Series i; 

 invaded by these masses. Mr. Tyrrell points out that % 

 the presence of gold veins in central Canada will now % 

 serve to mark the rocks in which they are found as S 

 "pre-Huronian," that is, older than the great uncon- i 

 formity. G. A. J. C. 1 



CHEMISTS AND MANUFACTURERS.-^ 



A MONG the many lessons which we are learning 

 ■^^ as the result of the war, not the least important 

 is the fact that experimental science in general, and 

 chemistry in particular, is not merely an interesting 

 intellectual occupation, but one of the foundation- 

 stones on which national progress rests, and that its 

 continued neglect could only lead to disaster, and end 

 in our complete defeat by more progressive and far- 

 seeing nations. 



The ignorance of the value of scientific knowledge 

 shown by our people is very great, and, unfortunately, 

 many of our rulers are little, if at all, better informed. 

 As a consequence, much inertia still remains to be over- 

 come, and a great deal of leeway has to be made up. 

 Happily, signs are not wanting that we are at last 

 directing our footsteps on the right path, and those 

 of us who know, and who have the real interests of 

 their country truly at heart, will earnestly pray that 

 our progress along that path may be certain and rapid. 



At the outbreak of war, the authorities were seem- 

 ingly unaware of the vast and multifarious services 

 rendered to the State by professional chemists, and of 

 the extent to which the welfare of the nation depended 

 ypon the adequate utilisation of their services. As a 

 result, many hundreds of highly-trained chemists were 

 to a great extent wasted by being put to military duties 

 which could easily have been performed by men whose 

 normal activities were of no special value to a nation 

 at war. 



This state of affairs lasted until a few months ago, 

 when the authorities apparently began to appreciate 

 the facts of the situation, and the Board of Trade 

 issued a circular of instructions to local tribunals under 

 Lord Derby's scheme, together with a "list of occupa- 

 tions (reserved occupations) of cardinal importance for 

 the maintenance of some other branches of trade and 

 industry." Since then the Board of Trade has issued 

 a further schedule of " reserved occupations," in which 

 occurs the following important paragraph : — " Chem- 

 ists : Analytical, Consulting Research Chemists (not 

 to be accepted for immediate enlistment or called up 

 for service with the Colours without the consent of 

 the Royal Society) ; Chemical Laboratories : Head 

 Laboratory Attendants." 



It will have been noticed that chemists are not only 

 not to be enlisted, but are not allowed to enlist with- 

 out the express permission of a recognised body, the 

 only other persons in the schedule who are treated 

 similarly being "licensed pilots, officers, and crews of 

 vessels belonging to the General Lighthouse Authori- 

 ties and lighthouse-keepers" — that is to say, men 

 whose services are absolutely essential for the public 

 safety. 



During the past eighteen months the columns of 

 the technical and of the general Press have been in- 

 undated with letters and with articles bewailing the 

 neglect of chemical science in this country, and de- 

 ploring the want of appreciation of the services of 

 chemists so often shown by manufacturers. That we 

 have shamefully neglected the claims of science is a 



1 From the presidential address deliverpd to the Society of Pub'ic Analyst^ 

 and other Analytical Chemists on 'February 2, by Mr. A. Chaston 

 Chapman. 



