NA TURE 



[April II, 1872 



the chapter which treats of river deltas and the dispersion 

 of sediment by currents, and in the description of reefs 

 of coral now growing over areas many hundred miles in 

 length, I shall have opportunities of convincing the 

 reader of the danger of hasty generalisations on this 

 head. I may also mention in this place that the \ast 

 distance to which the White Chalk can be traced east and 

 west over Europe as well as north and south, from Den- 

 mark to the Crimea, seemed to some geologists a pheno- 

 menon to which the working of the causes now in action 

 present no parallel. But the soundings made in the At- 

 lantic for the submarine telegraph have taught us that 

 white mud formed of organic bodies similar to those of 

 the ancient Chalk, is in progress over spaces still more 

 vast " (p. 109). 



The teaching of Sir Charles Lyell is that all the rocks 

 have been formed from pre-existing rocks as far back as 

 we can trace them, in the same manner as they are 

 being formed now, and that those which we see pre- 

 served are such as from their nature or suiTounding cir- 

 cumstances were fittest to survive the various denuding 

 forces to which they would from age to age be subjected. 



Surely this is the true theory of evolution applied to 

 geology. It does not, on the one hand, hold that the 

 world has been going on always just as it is — that after a 

 long period, during which all the varied forces of nature 

 have been in full activfty, the earth could be found in the 

 same state as it was at the commencement. Nor, on the 

 other hand, does it teach that the earth has been deve- 

 loped according to any original tendency or impulse, but 

 that by the uiiifonii action of forces such as we see now 

 in operation it has been evolved out of previous states. 



Nor is the objection valid that there is any " weakness 

 or logical defect " in the teaching which would limit the 

 inquiry to the period of which we have a record in the 

 crust of the earth. If the true methods are employed, it 

 is no objection to the methods themselves that their appli- 

 cation is not more extended. 



What were the possible or necessary first combinations 

 out of a chaotic mass is a fair subject for investigation ; 

 but an author is no more to be censured for excluding 

 it from a work treating of the visible crust of the 

 earth, than a philosophic writer on the history of Eng- 

 land is to be blamed for not including in his inquiry the 

 conditions of that part of the earth now represented by 

 our island previous to its last emergence from below the 

 sea. T. McK. Hughes 



( To be coniimied. ) 



NOTES 



Prof. Huxley's friends will be rejoiced to hear that he has 

 returned to this country', with his health and strength fully re- 

 cruited by his absence from work ; and that he has already 

 resumed his lectures a,t the Government School of Mines. 



The Examiner prints the following extract of a letter from 

 M. Elisee Reclus, dated Zurich, March 18: — "lam able at 

 last to tell you that I am free. After having been kept for a 

 long time in prisons, and sent from one prison to another, I left 

 Paris for Pontarlier, escorted by two police agents, who left me 

 on the free soil of Switzerland. While breathing and enjoying 

 thepure airof liberty, I do not forget those to whom I am indebted 

 for my freedom. Having been claimed by so many Englishmen 

 as a student of science, I shall work on more than ever to show 

 them my gratitude by my works and deeds." 



The Astronomer Royal will hold his first reception, as 

 President of the Royal Society, on Saturday evening, the 27th 

 inst. 



It will be seen from our report of the Proceedings of the 

 Cliemic.il Society that Prof. Cannissaro has been selected by the 

 Council to deliver the Faraday lecture on Thursday, May 30. 



The Council of the Society of Arts has invited members of 

 die Society to forward to the secretary, on or before April 29, 

 the names of such men of high distinction as they may think 

 worthy of receiving the Albert Medal, instituted to reward "dis- 

 thiguished merit in promoting arts, manufactures, or commerce." 

 The recipients of the medal since its foundation, in iS6.)., have 

 been Sir Rowland Hill, K.C.B., the Emperor of the French, 

 Prof. Faraday, Sir W. Fothergill Cooke and Sir C. Wheat- 

 stone, Sir Joseph Whitworth, Baron von Liebig, M. de Lesseps, 

 and Mr. Henry Cole, C.B. 



Mr. H. E. Armstrong has been appoi,nted Lecturer on 

 Botany and Vegetable Physiology at the University of Durham 

 College of Medicine, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. 



A NUMBER of gentlemen connected with the Iron and Steel 

 Institute, from the different parts of the Kingdom, and also from 

 the Continent, assembled last week to the number of 200 or 300 

 at the Teeside Works, Middlesborough, belonging to Messrs. 

 Hopkins, Gilkes, and Co., to witness the first public trial of the 

 rotary puddling machine of Mr. Danks, to which we have re- 

 cently refeiTed. The machine has been in work for two or three 

 weeks, and realises all that has been claimed for it by its inven- 

 tor, and all that has been stated of its practicability by the Iron 

 and Steel Institute Commission, which was sent to the United 

 States to investigate the working of the machine. On Friday 

 the gentlemen present saw the machine charged two or three 

 limes with molten metal, and generally the heat took about an 

 hour, with all the different preparations, from the time of draw- 

 ing the heat till the introduction of another. The quantity 

 puddled at one time was between 5 and 6 cvvt. generally, but as 

 high as i,ooolbs. have been put into the furnace at one charge. 

 The iron, after leaving the furnace, was hammered, and then 

 re-heated and rolled into bars, the quality of which was stated 

 to be very superior. They were all produced from No. 4, Cleve- 

 land pig iron. The "fettling" consisted of American ore and pot- 

 tery mine. The important adjunct of a "seezer," which is part 

 of Mr. Danks's invention, is not yet built, so that the operation 

 was not complete. An unexpected occurrence happened later 

 in the day, an opinion having been received from counsel {hat 

 Mr. Danks's patent was not valid. A meeting was held 

 between Mr. Danks and most of the gentlemen who had entered 

 into the provisional arrangement to pay him by the ic^h of April 

 50,000/. for the right of 200 of his furnaces, to which we have 

 already alluded, and he was informed that the arrangement 

 would not be ratified. The question remains open, and is 

 entrusted to a committee of the gentlemen interested, who will 

 report to a future meeting. 



The establishment is announced of a Meteorological Obser- 

 vatory at the top of the mountain of Puy-de-D6me. The 

 original cpst of i,ooofr. will be borne one-half by the State, 

 one-fourth by the town of Clermont, and one-fourth by the 

 Council-General of Puy-de-Dume. The annual cost of its 

 maintenance will devolve on the town of Clermont. 



Captain H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh, K.G.,' has 

 signified his intention of becoming a vice-president of the Insti- 

 tution of Naval Architects. 



Under the new management and direction of the Royal 

 Polytechnic Institution, it has been determined to re-establish 

 the scientific department of the Institution, and Mr. Edward V. 

 Gardner has been appointed Professor of Chemistry. We 

 understand that the Institution is about to arrange a well- 

 organised laboratory, proper chemical accessories for lectures, 

 classes, analyses, &c. , of which due notice mil be given in the 

 papers when the arrangements are completed. 



The Council of the Literary and Philosophical Society of 

 Leicester have received from Mr. John Bennett the sum of 20gs,, 



