September 28, 1893] 



NA TURE 



OJO 



by the formation of lakes owing to the blocking of 

 transverse valleys by the passage of ice across their 

 mouths. In another paper the same author connected 

 the granite boulders found in the Clyde Valley 

 about Glasgow and Gourock with the mass of plutonic rocks 

 occurring between the heads of Lochs Fyne and Lomond, and 

 supposes them to have been brought by ice coming through 

 Loch Fyne and Holy Loch, Loch Sloy, Loch Long, and the 

 Gareloch, and in much smaller numbers by Loch Lomond. 



Prince Kropotkin summed up his knowledge in the general 

 glaciation of Asia. The Lowlands and Steppes, under 2000 

 feet in height, do not appear to have been glaciated ; but all the 

 mountain ridges rising over the steppes, the great border ridges 

 like the Tian Shan, and the Alpine tracts fringing the plateau 

 were covered with immense glaciers, which descended to within 

 1000 feet of the sea level. The Vitim Plateau, the N.W. 

 Mongolia Plateau, the Pamirs, and the Great Khingim were 

 extensively glaciated. The southern portion of the High Plateau, 

 however, yields only indirect and not conclusive evidence of 

 glaciation. 



Prof. Sollas exhibited a large map, and gave an account of 

 the Esker Systems of Ireland. Eskers have always been difficult 

 to explain, and the best explanations have called in deposit by 

 rivers ; the difficulty has been to account for the disappearance 

 of their banks. Prof. Sollas suggests that the sustaining 

 walls may have been of ice, and that eskers are practi- 

 cally " casts of a glacial tunnel in gravel and sand." The eskers 

 of Ireland are like rivers in their windings, and in the reception 

 of trihularies at an acute angle. Deducing from the eskers the 

 ancient drainage system of the Irish glaciers we find a smaller 

 set draining from the glaciers of Sligo and Roscommon, and a 

 much more important set, embracing the whole central plain, 

 escaping by the valley of the Lififey 



Mr. C. A. Lindvall, of Stockholm, reviewed the principal 

 theories to account for the origin of the glacial period, and pro- 

 posed to account for it by the partial submergence of Northern 

 Europe to form an archipelago, through which escaped the cold 

 ice-bearing currents from the Arctic Ocean. The author further 

 endeavoured to show that the drifting of pack ice is sufficient to 

 account for the striation, eskers, boulders, and other glacial 

 signs in Scandinavia, Switzerland, and Scotland. 



Prof. Bonney read a paper which gave rise to brisk discussion, 

 in which Sir H. Howorth, Mr. Lamplough, Mr. Kendall, and 

 others took part. He denied that there was any proof of con- 

 siderable ground moraines in connection with existing glaciers, 

 that glaciers were potent encavators, and that there was any 

 evidence to show that ice had the power to scoop loose material 

 from a sea-bed and pile it up from above the water-level ; he 

 suggested that boulder-clays like those of Britain, so different 

 from Swiss moraines, may have had more than one origin. 



Messrs. Abbott and Kendall have found shell middens with 

 Cardiiim edttle, a sheep's tooth, bird bones, and charcoal, at 

 "The Qttinta," on Penmaenmawr, and in the Aber Valley ; they 

 consider them due to human agency. Mr. Cameron described a 

 mass of chalk, about a mile long, embedded in boulder clay at 

 Catworth, in Huntingdonshire. Mr. De Ranee concluded 

 that the rock valleys of Lancashire and Cheshire were 

 scooped by fluviatile agency when the land stood 300 feet 

 higher than at present, and many of them are now choked with 

 glacial detritus extending far into the Irish Sea. The so-called 

 inter-glacial gravels do not occur on one horizon, and often 

 several such beds are passed through in succession ; they are 

 regarded as having been partly formed in freshwater lakes and 

 partly under the ice. 



In the subject of palaeontology three '.reports were presented. 

 Prof. T. Rupert Jones described two species and two varieties 

 of Phyllopoda, and made corrections, suggestions, and criticisms 

 of other work ; Mr. Laurie and Mr. Smith Woodward reported 

 that progress was being made in working out the Eurypterids of 

 the Pentlands, and in the registration of type specimens of fossils 

 respectively. Dr. Traquair recorded Cepkalaspis {C. maqnifica) 

 for the first time from the Orcadian area of the Old Red Sand- 

 stone ; the cranial shield of this form, the largest known, is not 

 less than 8?. inches in length. Mr. E. T. Newton gave a concise 

 account of the Reptilia of the British Trias, including a notice 

 of two entirely new forms, one related to Stagonolepis, the 

 other a form intermediate between the crocodiles and dinosaurs. 

 Mr. R. B. Newton recorded the first known shells from the 

 English Keuper, discovered by Mr. Brodie and Mr. Richards in 

 the marl of the Upper Keuper Sandstone of Shrewley, Warwick- 



NO. 1248. VOL. 48] 



shire. They are referable to new species "of the genera 

 Thracia, Gonioinya, and Pholadomya, and are associated with 

 Acrodus and Eslheria. Prof. Sollas gave a careful and illus- 

 trated description of the minute anatomy of Monograptus 

 priodon, gathered from exceptionally perfect specimens ; three 

 layers are visible, the middle one being reticulated and thicken- 

 ing out to form the virgula and at the free edges of the theca;. 

 Mr. Montagu Browne referred several bones and teeth of Ter- 

 malosaunis alberlii,z.'a&. of undetermined species of PUsiosaurus, 

 to P. rostralus (Owen), from the Rhcetic ; he considered that 

 the teeth of several species of Saiirichthys would have to be 

 divided between fish and labyrinthodonts ; he also recorded the 

 discovery of Ceralodus from the Rhaetic. 



In a clear and well illustrated paper by Mr. Walcot Gibson 

 " On the Geology of Central East Africa" there is a descrip- 

 tion of the fringing reef bordering the land at Mombasa, suc- 

 ceeded by inland reefs rising up to 100 feet ; the latter rests on 

 a sedimentary series containing ammonites and ichthyosauria, 

 and in turn resting unconforraably on a great metamorphic 

 series of gneisses, schists and intrusive granites, which occupy an 

 area of fully two-thirds of Central East Africa. The remainder 

 of the country is formed of recent volcanic rocks, forming great 

 cones like Kilimanjaro, or arranged in lines running north and 

 south. Most of the volcanoes are dormant or extinct, and none 

 appear to be of great geological antiquity. Mr. R. D. Oldham 

 exhibited geological maps of India on the scales of 96 and 32 

 miles to the inch, showing the recent work of the Geological 

 Survey of that country ; the smaller-scale map is to be published 

 with the " Manual of the Geology of India." Mr. Myres 

 showed that the fundamental rocks at Caria were crystalline, 

 quartzose, and felspathic rocks with obscure foliation, traversed 

 by dykes and necks of two ages, one pre-Cretaceous, which 

 have supplied the volcanic rocks underlying the great mass of 

 Cretaceous limestone, and the other from which the Tertiary 

 volcanoes proceeded. The Cretaceous rocks were eroded before 

 the deposit of the Tertiary shore beds, which pass away 

 laterally into limestones ; these beds are roughly correlated with 

 those of Rhodes and Crete. Galena, pyrolusite, and a cobalt 

 mineral are found in the ancient rocks. 



Amongst the other papers it is only necessary to notice the 

 following briefly :— Mr. Fowler described a fault at Cinder Hill, 

 which causes greater displacement in the Carboniferous than in 

 the overlying Permian rocks. Dr. Hicks pointed to the frag- 

 ment in basal Cambrian rocks as indicating older series in 

 Wales ; Mr. Fox noted the wide extension of radiolarian chert 

 in Cornwall ; Mr. Bolton gave an account of the Skiddaw slates 

 of the north of the Isle of Man, which had yielded rare trilobites 

 and Dictyoneiiia ; Mr. Woodward's discovery of a bed of iron-ore 

 on the horizon of the Cleveland iron between the middleand upper 

 Lias of Raasay ; Prof. Herdman's note on a consolidated shelly 

 sand-bed from the bottom of the Irish Sea ; Prof. Milne's illus- 

 trated account of volcanic and earthquake phenomena in Japan ; 

 Dr. Johnston Lavis's record of the condition of Vesuvius during 

 the year, and his interesting note on the production of emerald- 

 green augites by the action of enclosed particles of quartz and 

 quartzite on a lava of Stromboli ; Mr. Jeffs' list of geological 

 photographs (140 in number) received during the year ; Mr. De 

 Ranee's report on the circulation of underground water ; and 

 Mr. Kendall's report on erratic blocks, including the detailed 

 survey of boulders in some considerable areas of the North of 

 England. 



In addition to the papers above reviewed, Section C took 

 part in two discussions with other sections, and held one on its 

 own ground. Mr. Topley, Prof. Bonney, Dr. Ball, Dr. Ro- 

 berts, and Prof. Lapworth were the chief speakers on the 

 limits of geology and geography; Prof. Sollas, Prof. Bonney, 

 and Dr. Rolhpletz, on the subject of coral reefs. The discus- 

 sion on geological education was led by Prof. Cole, in a lucid 

 paper on "Geology in Secondary Education," in which he ad- 

 vocated that, as a branch of history, geology should be taught to 

 all secondary students. He advocated jiractical teaching so far 

 as possible, and especially an acquaintance with the life history 

 of the globe. Prof. Lebour, following, insisted on the careful 

 selection of subjects in professional education and on the im- 

 portance of making every part of the teaching as practical as 

 possible, and encouraged experiments and field work, which 

 he thought might very well be aided from the County Council's 

 Technical Education Grant. These ideas were enforced by a 

 number of subsequent speakers. 



A word must be given to the series of photographs exhibited 



