8 NATURE 
[May 1, 1902 
THE FORTHCOMING BELFAST MEETING OF 
THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 
PREPARA for the forthcoming meeting at 
Belfast are already well advanced, and careful 
attention is being paid by the various committees to 
those details which make so much towards a satisfying 
and successful issue. 
The last meeting in Belfast was under the presidency 
of Prof. John Tyndall, whose famous address on that 
occasion will be remembered. It is interesting to note 
that at this year’s meeting the president-elect, Prof. 
Dewar, F.R.S., who has so widely extended the bounds 
of our knowledge of the properties of liquefied gases, 
comes to preside over this meeting of the Association in 
the place where the late Dr. Andrews made his classical 
researches on the same subject, and where a collection 
of his apparatus is preserved in the laboratory where he 
worked. 
The meeting will have ample accommodation in 
Queen’s College and neighbouring buildings, all within a 
radius of three minutes’ walk from the reception-room, 
which, as on the last occasion, will be the large examina- 
tion hall of the College. Most of the sections will, as 
before, find place in the lecture-rooms close at hand, 
those sections dealing with allied subjects being close to 
each other, an arrangement made more easy by the 
recent additions to the College buildings. These include 
chemical laboratories, physiological and _ pathological 
departments and a students’ union. 
The first general meeting will be held on Wednesday 
evening, September 10, in the Grosvenor Hall, which 
seats about 2500 persons, when the president-elect will 
deliver his inaugural address. 
The Friday evening discourse will be given by Prof. 
J. J. Thomson, F.R.S., on “ Becquerel Rays and Radio- 
activity,’ one of the most fascinating fields of advance 
in modern physics and a subject which affords scope 
fora wide range of experimental illustration. On Monday 
evening a discourse will be given by Prof. W. F. R. 
Weldon, F.R.S., on “Inheritance.” The Saturday evening 
lecture will be delivered by Prof. Louis C. Miall, F.R.S., 
and the subject will be “ Gnats and Mosquitoes,” about 
which so much interest has recently centred in connec- 
tion with the propagation of malarial fever. Conversa- 
ziones will be given on the Thursday and Tuesday 
evenings. 
It is intended to organise a loan collection illustrative 
of Irish antiquities and archeology and also of the 
progress of Belfast and its industries since remote times, 
and supplementing the interesting collections of a similar 
kind already existing in the local museums. 
It has been thought best to arrange for excursions on 
Saturday, September 13, to the most important and 
interesting localities only, and to provide for large 
numbers in each party rather than to have many excur- 
sions, the want of interest in the less important of which 
might cause disappointment. Efforts will be made to 
facilitate the attendance of the more distinguished 
members on these occasions. 
The chief excursions will be to: (1) Portrush and 
Giant’s Causeway. (2) Glenariff, Garron Head and 
Coast Road. (3) Newcastle, Tollymore Park and 
Mourne Mountains. (4) Warrenpoint and Carlingford. 
(5) Drogheda and the Valley of the Boyne. Specially 
prepared pamphlets will be issued as guides to the ex- 
cursions. A number of minor excursions will be so 
arranged as to suit the spare time that may be at the 
disposal of members. In connection with the meeting 
and the excursions, the following notes upon Belfast and 
the neighbourhood are of interest. 
For the paragraphs dealing with geology and botany I 
am indebted to Mr. S. A. Stewart, for that on zoology to 
Mr. Robert Patterson, and for that on archeology to 
NO. 1696, VOL. 66] 
Mr. F. J. Bigger. Further information on these or other 
allied subjects will be most willingly given to members 
by the hon. secretaries of either the Belfast Natural 
History and Philosophical Society, Belfast Museum, 
College Square, or the Belfast Naturalists’ Field Club at 
the same address. 
Geology.—The geological characters of the counties of 
Antrim and Down differ very widely. The river Lagan, 
which separates them, is also the dividing line between 
the Palzozoic rocks of the south-east and the interesting 
secondary series to the north. The city of Belfast is 
built mainly on drift deposits which overlie Triassic 
marls and sandstones. The hills which almost encircle 
the city are made up of eruptive masses of dolerite 
covering sedimentary deposits, which consist of hard 
Chalk, Upper Greensand, Lias Clays, Keuper Marls and 
Bunter Sandstones, the interior of the county being a 
more or less elevated plateau. These great masses of Trap, 
more than 1000 feet thick, have been erupted in succes- 
sive sheets, and contain beds of iron ore at certain levels. 
At Ballypallidy many fossil plant remains are found 
which determine the age of these erupted rocks as 
Eocene. The beautiful prismatic rocks of the Giant’s 
Causeway are well known, and this columnar Trap is seen 
in several places on the coast, though in minor masses 
and less developed form. Good sections of the sedi- 
mentary rocks may be seen in the Belfast hills, the 
Antrim coast road, Portrush, and elsewhere. A much 
indurated but fossiliferous bed of Lias clay, so hard as 
to appear flinty, occurs at Portrush. In the Cushendall 
district some older rocks are interpolated. At Cushendun, 
between Cushendall and Ballycastle, 1s a massive con- 
glomerate which has been supposed to be of the age of 
the Old Red Sandstone ; where it crops out on the shore 
some fine caverns have been excavated by the action of 
the sea. Carboniferous shales and sandstones occur near 
Ballycastle, and coal mining in these beds is of very 
ancient date. 
To the south and east of Belfast lies the county of 
Down, with its range of mountains stretching from New- 
castle to near Warrenpoint. There is little variety in 
the rocks of the county. The higher mountain peaks 
are of granite, while the stratified rocks of less elevation 
are very much hardened Lower Silurian grits and shales. 
The granite masses of the Mourne Mountains are valu- 
able building material, and they yield beryl, topaz and 
other much-prized minerals. Save the Silurian, there 
are scarcely any stratified rocks in the county. A very 
small patch of Permian occurs below high-water mark 
at Cultra, Belfast Bay,and with it a strip of Carboniferous 
Shale. At Newtownards is Scrabo Hill, which is an 
outlier of the New Red Sandstone ; and at Castle Espie, 
on Strangford Lough, is a very smallexposure of Carbon- 
iferous Limestone. Carlingford isin the county of Louth ; 
it is a Carboniferous Limestone country, as indeed is the 
greater part of that county. At Coalpit Bay, near 
Donaghadee, are Silurian shales with graptolites. 
Zoology.—The zoology of the district is exceedingly 
interesting, and specialists in any branch might well 
devote additional time to it beyond the official week. 
To the conchologist the district is a happy hunting- 
ground, fully two-thirds of the species of British land 
and freshwater mollusca being found here, some of 
extreme rarity, while several species that are very rare 
in England are found here in some numbers. The 
marine mollusca will also repay investigation, this being 
the only British locality for several species, while the 
richness of this fauna is shown by the fact that recently 
a single day’s dredging produced one species new to 
science and two more new to Britain. The coleopterist 
will also find an interesting fauna awaiting him, several 
species being found here which are unknown elsewhere 
in Britain. September is rather late for the lepidopterist, 
otherwise some good things might be found. But, 
