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NA TURE 



[September i, 1892 



profit may sometimes indirectly arise from some branches of 

 astronomical work or investigation ; but the only sound and 

 honest reason that can be given for such work is, that it 

 stimulates the highest form of intellectual activity, widens the 

 already broad field of investigation,' and increases the sum of 

 human knowledge. Whoever pleads the cause of astronomy on a 

 lower plane discounts the intelligence of himself or of his audience. 

 Why should the astronomer stoop to select a less noble theme, 

 or consider it from a lower point of view ? He who leads 

 an intelligent and thoughtful life must feel himself in daily 

 touch with those phenomena that are involved in the most im- 

 portant astronomical problems of the present and the immediate 

 future. The figure and motions of the earth which he treads ; 

 the constitution and translation of the sun that invigorates his 

 life and lights his days ; the movements and structure of the 

 moon and planets that beautify his nights ; the proper motions 

 and distances of the countless stars that nightly set before his 

 eyes the highest types of rigorous law and of boundless space 

 that the mind can grasp ; all of these, and more, tend to convince 

 him that the constantly growing demand for broader and more 

 exact knowledge is ample warrant for the time and expense in- 

 volved in the most profound astronomical investigation. In this 

 direction lies the justification of astronomical research ; on this 

 basis the astronomer is sure of the stimulating support of every 

 cultivated mind as long as the questions " why " and "how " are 

 constantly reiterated and still are unanswered. On this ground, 

 and on this alone, rest the valid reasons for the expenditure of 

 corporate, municipal, or national funds for the establishment of 

 expensive observatories and the prosecution of astronomical in- 

 vestigations ; and in the closing years of this century the con- 

 scientious astronomer can in no way more thoroughly vindicate 

 the highest claims of his science than by holding the standard of 

 work well above the popular fancies of the hour, and by devot- 

 ing his time and energy to that class of fundamental work that 

 shall not only satisfy the rigorous demands of the present time, 

 but shall make the last decade of the nineteenth century an 

 important epoch in the real progress of astronomy. 



GEOLOGY AT THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 



IVr EARLY fifty papers were contributed to Section C during 

 the meeting of the British As-ociation, and although no 

 new facts or theories of startling interest were brought forward, 

 the record of the year's geological work was decidedly above the 

 average. Owing to Professor Lapworth's regrettable illness his 

 address could not be delivered until Monday, and the chair at 

 the meetings had usually to be taken by one of the vice- 

 presidents. 



Glacial and local papers occupied the first two days, the most 

 remarkable being the pair by Messrs. Peach and Home on the 

 Radiolarian Chert of Arenig age, once probably a deep-sea ooze, 

 which covers 3000 square miles in the southern uplands, and 

 passes like the Moffat shales into sediment when traced towards 

 the north. When the chert is traced to within half a mile of the 

 Loch Doon granite the quartz has become quite granulitic, the 

 radiolaria being still recognizable in the matrix although there 

 is a faint development of mica ; close to the granite the rock is 

 completely recrystallized, and consists entirely of large quartz 

 particles full of liquid cavities and rounded inclusions of biotite. 

 Dr. Hicks claimed as pre-Cambrian some tender gneisses, schists, 

 quartziies, and limestones, of the central Highlands, of which he 

 gave microscopic descriptions, and Prof. Blake argued that the 

 discovery of Olenellus of the type of O. Tkompsoni, in beds 

 above the Torridon sandstone, did not necessarily parallel these 

 beds with those containing Olenellus beneath the Paradonides 

 zone of America. Amongst the other papers dealing with 

 Palaeozoic rocks may be noted Prof. Blake's discovery of a 

 felsite like that of Llyn Padarn, apparently intrusive into the 

 Llanberis slates, seen in a new section in the Penrhyn quarries ; 

 Prof. SoUas's discovery of bodies like radiolaria in the slates of 

 Howth, and the limestone of Culdaff; and Prof. Bonney's 

 comparison of the pebbles of the English Bunter with those in 

 the old red conglomerates in Scotland. 



Several important glacial papers were read. Dr. Crosskey 

 reported on the recording of new erratics chiefly in the north of 

 England. Mr. Lomas traced Boulders of the Ailsa Craig, 

 Riebeckite Rock, on Moel Tryfaen, in Anglesey and the Vale 



NO. 1192, VOL. 46] 



of Clwyd, at Liverpool and Birkenhead. Mr. Bell considered 

 that the evidence from the shell-beds of Clava and Chapelhall 

 was less consistent with the theory of submergence than with 

 that of transportation by land ice. Messrs. Peach and Home 

 adduced evidence to show that in Sutherland and Ross-shire, 

 at the time of greatest glaciation, the ice-shed was to the east of 

 the present watershed, and the lofty mountains of Assynt and 

 Loch Maree were glaciated by ice travelling westward. Mr. 

 Clement Reid gave a list of twenty-eight species of Arctic plants 

 from a series of silted-up tarns at Corstorphine and Hailes, near 

 Edinburgh. Prof. Axel Blyth exhibited and described a 

 beautiful set of plant remains preserved in calcareous tufas from 

 Gudbrandsdal, in central Norway. The investigation of the 

 Elbolton cave will probably be completed this year, and it has 

 so far failed to reveal any trace of occupation by Palaeolithic 

 man. Messrs. Peach and Home have studied one out of a group 

 of caves in the Assynt limestone of Sutherlandshire, and found 

 charcoal with split and calcined bones of reindeer, fox, and 

 grouse in the upper layers, and a finely preserved canine tooth 

 of brown bear at a depth of about five feet from the surface. Mr. 

 Coates gave a description of the cuttings, chiefly in boulder-clay, 

 in the Crieff and Comrie railway. And Mr. Kendall attributed 

 the glacical period to variability in the heat of the sun. 



Foremost amongst the palseontological papers stands that of 

 Mr. E. T. Newton, in which was given an account of several 

 remarkable skulls obtained from the Elgin sandstone and pro- 

 bably belonging to two or three species related to the African 

 dicynodonts ; together with these occurred the skull of a reptile 

 allied to Pareiasaurus of the Karoo beds, but with no less than 

 thirty horns varying from a quarter of an inch to three inches in 

 length. Mr. M. Laurie described two new species of Etiryp- 

 terus, two of Stylonurtis, and one of a new genus, Drepanoptertis, 

 of Eurypterids from the Silurian rocks of the Pentland Hills. The 

 work of the type committee still continues, and lists have been 

 received from several museums and private collectors. Reports 

 were also presented on Cretaceous Polyzoa and Palaeozoic 

 Phyllopoda, and a paper by Mr. Bullen Newton recorded the 

 discovery of Chonetes Pratti in the carboniferous rocks of 

 Western Australia. 



The petrological papers included a note on the Malvern crys- 

 talline rocks, by Mr. Irving , one on the felsites, andesiles, a. id 

 diabases of Builth, by Mr. Woods ; and a short note on the 

 Limerick Traps, by Mr. Watts. Mr. Ussher endeavoured to 

 prove that there must have been a rigid mass occupying the 

 position of the Devon and Cornwall granites at the time when 

 the stratified rocks were folded, in order to account for the 

 deviations in their strike. Mr. Goodchild argued that the 

 junction of the granite of the Ross of Mull was best explained 

 by the absorption of sedimentary rocks in the granite. Mr. 

 Harker explained the presence of porphyritic quartz in basic 

 igneous rocks by supposing that it had formed in the upper 

 layers of a magma basin, and sunk to its present position by 

 gravity. Mr. Teall gave a sketch of the succession of rocks in 

 an area of gneisses, which accorded with the succession from basic 

 to acid types in plutonic masses ; and Mr. Somervail en- 

 deavoured to explain the chief rocks in the Lizard area by 

 segregation from a single magma. 



Finally must be mentioned Professor Hull's paper on the 

 Physical Geology of Arabia Petrcea ; a very interesting 

 paper by Miss Ogilvie, on the landslips in the South Tyrol, in 

 which she showed how much the mapping of that region was 

 complicated by the constant repetition of portions of the strata 

 by landslips ; a new classification of the New Red Sandstone of 

 Northern England, by Mr. Goodchild ; and papers on the Green 

 sand and Fuller's Earth of Bedfordshire, by Mr, Cameron. 



Dr. Johnstone Lavis's report on Vesuvius chronicled the 

 phases of eruption in the past year, and was illustrated by a 

 beautiful series of photographs, chiefly of fumarolles and 

 spiracles in the streams of lava. Mr. De Ranee's report on 

 underground water was continued. Mr. Davison's earthquake 

 report dealt chiefly with new forms of seismic apparatus, and the 

 photographic committee recorded that the collection of geo- 

 logical photographs now numbered 700, amongst which half 

 the English counties and Scotland were, however, poorly repre- 

 sented. An excellent exhibition of the photographs was held 

 in a room provided for the purpose, where also the Geological 

 Survey of Scotland showed a fine series of views illustrating 

 the scenery and structures of the ancient gneisses and schists of 

 the Highlands. 



