go 



NA TURE 



[November 23, 1905 



The proceedings in the arts theatre then ended, and Lord 

 Onslow and the council and senate and guests walked 

 through the university grounds to the new zoology build- 

 ings, where, after a short speech by Prof. Herdman, Sir 

 John Murray addressed the assembly upon oceanography. 

 Mr. R. B. Haldane also delivered a brief speech, in the 

 course of which he remarked that by obtaining the grant 

 of 200/. from the Chancellor of the Exchequer Sir Thomas 

 Elliott had established a principle and connected the 

 University of Liverpool with His Majesty's Government. 



The Department of Zoology. 

 The Derby chair of natural history was established by the 

 fifteenth Earl of Derby in 1881 — an appropriate gift from 

 a descendant of the scientific founder 1 of the celebrated 

 zoological collections once alive at Knowsley and now 

 secured to Liverpool in the Derby Museum of the Public 

 Galleries. The first Derby professor was appointed al the 

 end of :88l, and thus natural history was one of the 

 three or four scientific departments with which Universit) 

 College opened in January, 1882. The work of the 

 Liverpool Marine Biolog) Committee has been so in- 

 timately bound up with the Natural History Department 

 during the last twenty years that, although nut, strictly 

 speaking, a part of the university organisation, it is im- 

 possible to omit a brief record of its history. Established 

 for the purpose of exploring the fauna and flora ol Liver- 



I I Bay and the neighbouring parts of the Irish Sea, il 



brought a number of the local field-naturalists into close 

 relation with the university department and laboratory 

 methods, it gave rise t" dredging expeditions and observ- 

 ations and experiments at sea, which led on in later years 

 to sea-fisheries investigations, and it resulted in the accumu- 

 lation of collections which have proved of considerable 

 interest and scientific value. The " local " collection in 

 the museum of the new buildings lias been almost wholly 

 obtained through the work of the L.M.B.C. 



Probably the most important outcome of this exploring 

 work has been the establishment of a marine biological 

 station on the west coast of England. After ti\e years' 

 use of an old Dock Board observatorj on Puffin Island, 

 off Anglesey, the committee moved their marine station 

 to Port Erin, at the south end of the Isle of Man, where 

 they have now a substantial, new, two-storeyed building, 

 measuring 115 feet by 45 feet, containing laboratories, an 

 aquarium, and a fish-hatchery, and provided with a large, 

 open-air, sea-water pond for the spawning and rearing of 

 fish. As to the results obtained from this institution (which 

 is under the direction of the Derby professor, and is worked 

 in connection with the university department), it will suffice 

 to state that during the last year thirty-six investigators 

 worked in the laboratory, about five millions of young 

 plaice were sent out to sea from the fish-hatchery, and more 

 than thirteen thousand visitors paid for admission to the 

 aquarium. 



It was certainly to this marine biological work in the 

 past that the natural history department owed in the first 

 instance that connection with the local sea-fisheries authori- 

 ties which has recently developed into a formal agreement 

 between the university and the Lancashire and Western 

 Sea Fisheries Committee. The scientific work of the 

 local fisheries district is carried on in the laboratories by 

 assistants paid by the Fisheries Committee, and the pro- 

 fessor has been appointed honorary director of the scientific 

 work, and furnishes an annual report on the work of the 

 fisheries laboratory. A share of the laboratory accommoda- 

 tion in the new buildings will be devoted to the furtherance 

 of the work of the Liverpool Marine Biology Committee, 

 of the Lancashire and Western Sea Fisheries Committee, of 

 economic entomology, and of other useful applications 

 of zoology. 



It has been recognised for some vears that the accommo- 

 dation in the old college buildings was quite inadequate 

 to meet the wants of this department, and although some 

 extensions had been made, such as a wooden fisheries 

 laboratory on the roof and a convenient little museum 

 (given about ten years ago by the late Mr. George Holt), 

 these were temporary expedients which in some ways only 

 emphasised th.- pressing need for new and much larger 



1 The thirteenth F.arl of Derby, President ol the I innean Society, 1828- 

 i8>3, and .subsequently President of the Zoological Society. 



NO. 1882, VOL. 73] 



buildings. Research work offered to the department was 

 hampered, and in some cases had to be declined for want 

 of room. These facts were given expression to in the state- 

 ments of needs drawn up in connection with the university 

 movement of iqoi-2, and after the establishment of the 

 university a sum of 18,000/. was voted to the council by 

 the university committee in October, 1902, for the purpose 

 of erecting and equipping a new department of zoology, to 

 contain a museum and a lecture theatre, the necessary 

 students' laboratories, and also accommodation for sea 

 fisheries investigations and other lines of marine biological 

 research. 



The New Buildings. 

 This zoological institute has a frontage of 123 feet on 

 the western side of Brownlow Street, is 41 feet from front 

 to back, and 84 feet in height from the street level. It is 

 built of red pressed brick relieved with white sandstone 

 from the Storeton quarries in Cheshire. The building 

 1. nisi, is of a central tower containing the entrance hall 

 and staircase and some of the smaller rooms on each floor, 

 and of two blocks, the north and the south, which have 

 been treated rather differently as regards internal structure. 

 The south block has only three main floors, while the 

 north has five in the same height. The central tower 

 extends a storey higher. In the south block the three 

 floors accommodate (1) the museum with its large gallery; 



(2) the lecture theatre ; and (3) the large junior laboratory 

 at the top of the building. In the north block, on the 

 two lower floors there are extensions of the museum to 

 receive special collections, and the rest of the space is 

 devoted to the senior class-room, senior and honours 

 students' laboratories, the departmental library, and rather 

 large laboratory and store-room accommodation for the sea 

 fisheries department, the work of the economic entom- 

 ologist, of the marine biological committee, and other 

 practical applications of zoology. In the central tower, 

 along with the staircase, there are small rooms for the 

 professor and two demonstrators, the laboratory assistant, 

 with diagram, chemical, aquarium, photographic, macer- 

 ating rooms and students' lavatories. 



GEOLOGY AT THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 

 T X Section C the papers read were largely on subjects 

 ■^ of local interest, and in many cases by South African 

 geologists. The delivery of the presidential address in this 

 section having been fixed for the meeting at Johannes- 

 burg, the proceedings at Cape Town were opened with a 

 short address of introduction by the president, followed by 

 a lecture by Mr. A. W. Rogers, the director of the 

 Colonial Geological Survey, on the outlines of the geology 

 of the Cape Colony. 



Among the subjects discussed, the Karroo claimed a 

 considerable share of attention. Prof. R. Broom, in a 

 paper on the classification of the Karroo beds, retained the 

 division into Dwyka, Ecca, Beaufort, and Stormberg 

 series. He subdivides the Beaufort series into three, and 

 the Stormberg into two parts on reptile evidence, and 

 correlates the various divisions with European strata 

 thus : — Dwyka and Ecca series with Lower and Middle 

 Permian, Lower Beaufort beds with Upper Permian, 

 Middle and Upper Beaufort beds with Lower and Upper 

 Trias, Lower Stormberg beds with Rha-tic, and Upper 

 Stormberg beds with Lower Jurassic. 



Mr. A." L. du Toit gave an account of the Stormberg 

 formation in (ape Colony. This uppermost division of 

 the Karroo beds consists of a considerable thickness of 

 nearly horizontal sandstones, shales, and volcanic rocks, 

 and includes (in descending order) : — (4) Volcanic Beds ; 



(3) Cave Sandstone; (2) Red Beds; (1) Molteno Beds. The 

 formation covers a considerable area in the east of the 

 colony, in the Stormberg and Drakensberg districts, the 

 summits of the mountains being commonly formed of the 

 lava flows of (4). The sediments were deposited in an 

 inland sea, the "Karroo Lake," the southern shore-line 

 of which ran along the present coast-ranges of the colony, 

 and thence north-eastward, outside and parallel with the 

 coast-line of Natal. The author suggests the correlation 

 of the Volcanic Beds and Cave Sandstone with the 

 Rajmah.il series of India (Middle? and I. ewer Jurassic), and 

 1 f the Molteno beds with the Kota-Maleri series of India 

 and the Wianamatta series of New South Wales (Rhalic). 



