80 Miscellaneous. 



anccs, will obtain the countonauco of the public, just as in an 

 earlier stage it has met with the approbation of the Council of the 

 Koyal Cicographical ^Society"*. 



" Outline of a Scheme for a Systeviatic Survey of the Sea and Sea- 

 bed between Ireland and Neufottndland, with a vieiv to the esta- 

 blishment of Teler/raphic Communication between the ttvo Countries. 

 By G. C. Wallich, M.D. 



" Although fully sensible that it forms no part of the province of 

 the Royal Geographical Society to discuss the commercial or social 

 questions involved in the establishment of telegraphic communica- 

 tion between distant regions of the globe, I believe myself war- 

 ranted in assuming that the Society has already evinced its 

 readiness to promote, by every means in its power, those scientific 

 inquiries which bear more or less directly on physical geography, 

 and on the due prosecution of which the successful accomplishment 

 of every great submarine telegraphic enterprise must principally 

 depend. 



" It is under this impression that I venture to submit to the Pre- 

 sident and Council a scheme for a systematic survey of a portion 

 of the ocean, devised in the present instance with reference to a 

 particular line, but which may be made equally applicable to the 

 survey of any oceanic area. 



" It is obviously needless for me to remind the Council of the 

 fitful and fruitless efforts that have been made from time to time 

 during the past two or three years to raise funds for the renewal 

 of the original Mid-Atlantic Telegraph line; and it is also unne- 

 cessary for me to dwell on the inestimable benefits both of a com- 

 mercial and social nature likely to accrue to Great Britain and 

 America when the two countries shall be ' en rapport,' since 

 every succeeding day only tends to bring them more vividly before 

 the public. I allude to such matters solely with a view to show 

 that, notwithstanding an almost universal recognition of these 

 benefits, some deep-rooted doubt prevents both the Government 

 and the public from lending that pecuniary encouragement to the 

 undertaking without which it is impracticable to carry it into 

 execution. 



"This doubt, I would submit, is in a great measure attributable 

 to the conviction that the methods of surveying the sea-bed, here- 

 tofore practised, are wholly inadequate to the requirements of the 

 case ; in other words, that the mere transit of a surveying-ship 

 across a predetermined arc of the ocean, the investigation of the 

 depths at intervals also predetermined, or, at all events, determined 

 ■with no reference to the information evolved en route ; and, lastly, 

 the deceptive results sometimes incidental to the hitherto employed 

 mode of exploring the general character of the sea-bottom ; do not 

 }-ield either the amount or the kind of knowledge which is essential 



♦ Anniversary Address delivered by Sir Roderick xMurchison at the 

 Roviil (jeograjihical Society, ^lay 25. 1863. (Proc. Roy. Geograph. 

 Sue. vol. vii. no. 4, pp. 166, 167.) 



