May 31, 1900] 



NA TURE 



105 



Dr. Copeland's party— has chosen a site up the hill be- 

 hind the town some distance from the jetty. 



Elaborate arrangements have been made for the obser- 

 vation of shadow bands, two walls, E. and W. and N. and 

 S., composed of first-class volley targets 16 x 6ft., having 

 been erected on a level space which has been white- 

 washed. 



Six discs have been set up on spars, and most careful 

 drills have taken place. I have been quite astonished at 

 the exact reproduction of all the features of a dummy 

 corona set up on each occasion. 



It appears that the east wind is the best for us, and it 

 is blowing now ; a cloudy morning generally is followed 

 by a cloudless sky in the afternoon. The weather chances 

 are good, but they are not perfect. 



Norman Lockyer. 



FIFTY YEARS OF GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 

 IN INDIA. 

 T^HOUGH the Honourable East India Company had 

 -^ showed their interest in the advancement of 

 geological science by the appointment, so long ago as 

 1818, of a geologist to the Great Trigonometrical Survey, 

 it is but fifty years since the first " Report of the 

 Geological Survey of India for 1848-49," by Dr. John 

 McClelland, was published. In 1851 Dr. McClelland 

 was relieved by Dr. Thos. Oldham, who, on his arrival 

 in Calcutta, found the Geological Survey represented in 

 the capital of India by a room, a box and a messenger. 

 One assistant, Mr. W. Theobald, was already in the 

 employment of the Company, and during the following 

 five years seven assistants were appointed, of whom but 

 Mr. H. B. Medlicott and Dr. W. T. Blanford, names 

 cut deep in the record of Indian geology, survive. 



It was not, however, till 1856 that the Geological 

 Survey was established as a regularly organised service, 

 with a sanctioned establishment of superintendent (now 

 styled director), fifteen graded assistants and a palaeonto- 

 logist. In spite of the increased area over which British 

 rule extends, the establishment sanctioned in 1856 

 remained the same, with some minor, temporary changes, 

 and an alteration of nomenclature, till 1892, when, 

 instead of an increase, the permanent staff was reduced 

 by three, and to compensate for this reduction arrange- 

 ments were made for the employment of two " specialists " 

 for terms of years, who were expected to devote their 

 services more especially to economic geology. From 

 one cause and another, this scheme has not received a 

 full trial yet, and it is only during the present year that 

 the full sanctioned staff is at work. The experiments so 

 far made in the temporary employment of assistance to 

 the Geological Survey, for the special purpose of economic 

 work, cannot be regarded as successful, and the result of 

 the present trial will be watched with interest, as it is 

 likely to have great influence in the shaping of the future 

 course and policy of the Survey. 



The concrete results of less than half a century's 

 work with this inadequate staff are a geological map of 

 nearly the whole of India proper, which is accurate as 

 regards its main features for this large area, and as 

 regards details for a large proportion of it ; and a con- 

 siderable acquaintance, largely accompanied by maps, 

 with the mountainous country to the north-west and 

 north, and of the countries to the east, which are included 

 in the Indian Empire. The published results are con- 

 tained in thirty volumes of the " Records," twenty-nine 

 of the " Memoirs," and twenty volumes, not counting 

 those only partly published, of the " Paheontologia 

 Indica." 



Besides this collection of separate memoirs there was 

 prepared, with the approval and sanction of the Govern- 

 ment of India, a " Manual of the Geology of India," in 

 two volumes, by Messrs. H. B. Medlicott and W. T. 



NO. 1596, VOL. 62] 



Blanford, published in 1879, to which were subsequently 

 added a volume on the " Economic Geology," by the 

 late Dr. Valentine Ball, and one on the " Mineralogy," 

 by Mr. F. R. Mallet. These volumes contained not only 

 much information collected by the Survey, which it had 

 not been possible to publish previously, but for the first 

 time, by collecting scattered information into one general 

 review, made the geology of India generally accessible 

 and intelligible. The need for, and value of, these 

 volumes is shown by the fact that they soon went out of 

 print, and in 1894 a revised version of the first two 

 volumes was issued. The progress of the Survey in?' the 

 period intervening between these two issues had been so 

 great that a totally different scheme could be adopted, 

 and instead of the series of separate descriptions of 

 isolated areas, which was to a large extent inevitable in 

 1879, it was possible to treat the geology of India 

 as an harmonious whole in 1894. A re-issue of the third 

 volume of the original edition, the volume on " Economic 

 Geology,'- has also been commenced, but though 

 nominally a re-issue, it is, even more than in the case of 

 the stratigraphical and structural geology, a new book, 

 being different in scope and in aims, and containing no 

 part of the original work. 



The results of the Geological Survey, apart from its 

 publications, are to be looked for both in India and out 

 of it. In India, in the economic development of the 

 Empire ; and out of India, in the influence they have 

 had on the advancement of geological science. The 

 former of these is naturally that to which the Adminis- 

 tration attaches the greater importance, and in this con- 

 nection the existence of the Survey is amply justified in 

 the fact that two of the coal-fields, which yield an im- 

 portant part of the coal supply of India, were discovered 

 and explored by the Geological Survey. Singarenni, 

 surveyed by Dr. W. King, and Umaria, by Mr. T. W. 

 Hughes, have, from their geographical position, a much 

 greater importance than would appear merely from a 

 numerical statement of the number of tons of coal raised 

 in them, for they serve to supply a large area with cheap 

 fuel which would otherwise be deprived of that advantage. 

 These two fields in themselves would justify the existence 

 of the Survey, from an economic point of view, apart 

 from other benefits ; but besides this the existence of a 

 band of trained advisers, and of the observations accu- 

 mulated by them, has frequently been instrumental in 

 preventing the useless expenditure of large sums of 

 money, and in this way alone the Survey has rendered an 

 ample return for its maintenance. 



Though the Administration is naturally most interested 

 in the economic aspects of the work of the Geological 

 Survey, there has never been any attempt to convert it into 

 a mere prospecting or mining department. The Govern- 

 ment of India has always recognised purely scientific 

 work as an important duty of the Survey, and regarded 

 the advancement of science not only as a thing to be de- 

 sired and encouraged on its own account, but as further- 

 ing and rendering more valuable the economic results of 

 the Survey, by improving the instrument with which it 

 works. It is this portion of the work of the Survey 

 which is of the greater interest outside India, and more 

 especially to the readers of N.\ture. 



First among the results which have influenced the 

 course of geological science may be placed the recogni- 

 tion of the importance of deposits formed on land, in which 

 Indian survey took an early and important part. It was 

 shown that the Gangetic alluvium, formerly looked upon 

 as a marine deposit, was, as regards its upper layers at 

 least, a land deposit ; it was shown that the great series 

 of sandstones and conglomerates of which the foot-hills 

 of the Himalayas are composed were formed, not in the 

 sea, but on land, by rivers which were the ancestors of 

 those now draining the Himalayas ; the great Gondwana 

 system was shown to be exclusively a dry land deposit, 



