446 



NATURE 



[October 7, 1909 



It is this positive duty towards each other and our 

 race bf'\ond the seas which those who live in our island 

 home have been slow in realising, and it has been a 

 real blot on our educational system that such ideas as 

 Imperial responsibility and Imperial necessities have not 

 been inculcated in the young people in our schools and 

 colleges. As an illustration, I may observe that it has 

 been even debated and doubted in some responsible quarters 

 in England whether the Union Jack should wave over our 

 educational institutions on the days of national festivity 

 and national observance. 



To sum up. By these and other kindred means I would 

 urge a closer educational touch between the Mother 

 Country and the Empire at large. 



Long ago a great Minister was able to say : " Our 

 hold of the Colonies is in the close affection which grows 

 from common names, from kindred blood, and from 

 similar privileges. These are ties which, though light as 

 air, are strong as links of iron." 



But times have changed. To-day we are confronted 

 with the problems of a vast and complicated Empire — 

 great commonwealths, great dominions, sundered from 

 each other by long seas and half a world, and however 

 closely science has geographically brought them together, 

 we cannot in soul and sympathy, nor ultimatelv in destinv. 

 remain attached, affiliated as mother and children should 

 be, unless we grapple to each other and understand each 

 other in the greatest of all interests — the educational train- 

 ing which we give to our chilcjren in the one part of 

 our Empire to make them suitable citizens in another. 



Tn suggesting reforms and modifications in which this 

 educational unify may best be expressed, forgive me if 

 I have but touched, and touched inadequatelv, on the 

 fringe of a great subject, the transcendent importance of 

 which it requires no elaboration of mine to imnress on 

 the earnest attention of the people of this great Dominion 

 — which great Dominion may I be allowed to salute, with- 

 out flatterv or favour, as the most favoured by natural 

 beauty and hy virgin wealth of all the children of our 

 common Motherland? May T salute her in terms which 

 formed the old toast with which the two greatest of our 

 English public schools, Winchester and Eton, pledged each 

 other when we met in our annual cricket contest : Mater 

 pulchra, filia fiulchriorl 



GEOLOGY AT THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 

 TF the number of geologists from the British Isles who 

 attended the meeting of Section C was somewhat 

 limited, the number from the American continent was con- 

 siderable, and it was greatly to them, and especially to 

 those from Canada, that the markedly successful character 

 of the sectional meetings was due. The Canadian geo- 

 logists not only contributed a particularly interesting series 

 of papers, but also arranged two excursions, which were 

 largely attend^i. 



The papers read before the section may be classified in 

 four groups. 



(i) Straligrafihical Geology. 



Mr. J. B. Tyrrell's account of the geology of Western 

 Canada, which followed the president's address, afforded 

 an excellent introduction to the succeeding series of papers 

 on local geology. Prc-Cambrian gcologv naturallv occupied 

 a good deal of the attention of the section, which had the 

 advantage of hearing papers by Prof. A. P. Coleman on 

 the bearing of pre-Cambrian geology on uniformitarianism, 

 and by Prof. W. G. Miller on the pre-Cambrian rocks of 

 Canada. Prof. Coleman described the somewhat compli- 

 cated subdivision which Canadian geologists recognise in 

 the pre-Cambrian rocks, and pointed out the varied nature 

 of their origin, including as they do quartzites, sand- 

 stones sometimes passing into arkose, carbonaceous shale, 

 limestone, igneous rocks both volcanic and intrusive, and 

 metaniorphic rocks in great variety. The most interesting 

 point about Prof. Coleman's paper was the evidence he 

 brought forward for the existence of glacial conditions in 

 pre-Cambrian (Huronian) times, and the bearing of this on 

 uniformitarianism. He exhibited stones which he had ex- 

 tracted from the pre-Cambrian conglomerate of the Cobalt 

 district, the upper surface of which was scratched by the 

 Pleistocene glaciation, while the lower (embedded) surface 

 NO. 2084, VOL. 81] 



after extraction, also showed stria' which it ' was -difficult 

 to distinguish from those produced by the Pleistocene ice. 

 In the subsequent discussion Drs. Fairchild, ' Strahan, 

 Warren Upham, and Dwerryhouse expressed the opinion 

 that Prof. Coleman had established his contention. 



Prof. Miller's paper was chiefly directed to bringing into 

 prominence the almost limitless mining possibilities of the 

 Canadian pre-Cambrian rocks. He pointed out that 

 although they have as yet been very imperfectly explored, 

 they are already, in the Cobalt and Sudbury districts, 

 the chief, or among the chief, world's source of nickel, 

 cobalt, silver, and arsenic, while in the Michigan district 

 their yield of copper and iron is one of the most important 

 in the world. The same may be said with regard to the 

 mica mines of Ontario. ' 



The stratigraphy of the Pahx-ozoic rocks of the British 

 Isles was represented by the reports of several of the 

 association's committees, including the following : — (i) Mr. 

 E. S. Cobbold, on the Cambrian- rocks of Comley, Shrop- 

 shire ; {2) Prof. S, H. Reynolds, on the igneous and 

 associated rocks of the Glensaul district, Co. Galway ; 

 and (3) Dr. .\. Vaughan, on the faunal succession of the 

 Lower Carboniferous (Avonian) of the British Isles. The 

 latter report includi'd an important series of tables embody- 

 ing Dr. Vaughan 's latest views on the subdivision of the 

 Lower Carboniferous rocks, and the correlation of the 

 sequence in various parts of the British Isles. With the 

 view of helping to bring Dr. ^'aughan's work to the notice 

 of Canadian geologists, Prof. S. H. Reynolds exhibited 

 a series of lantern-slides of the two principal sections of the 

 Bristol district, those of the .\von and of Burrington. He 

 also contributed a paper on the lithology of the Burrington 

 section. Another stratigraphical paper having reference to 

 the Carboniferous rocks of the south-west of England was 

 that by Mr. H. Bolton, on new faunal horizons in the 

 Bristol coalfield, in wliich further evidence was brought 

 forward of the occurrence of marine episodes in the Coal- 

 measures of this part of the country. The only remaining 

 str.atigraphical paper w-as one b)' Dr. D. Woolacott, on 

 the classification of the Permian rocks of the north-east of 

 England. 



(2) Glacial Geology. 



Glacial geology naturally had much attention paid to it 

 by the section when meeting in Canada, and the members 

 were to be congratulated on hearing from Dr. Warren 

 Upham an account of the glacial Lake Agassiz, in con- 

 nection with which his name is so well known. At its 

 inaximum extent, according to Dr. Upham, it covered an 

 area of about 110,000 square miles, exceeding the com- 

 bined areas of the five great lakes tributary to the St. 

 Lawrence. Lake W'innipeg forms its reduced representative 

 at the present day. Dr. Upham 's paper was followed by 

 an interesting discussion, in which many leading Canadian 

 and American geologists took part. Members of the 

 section had, further, the opportimitv of seeing some of the 

 glacial and other deposits of Lake .Agassiz on excursions 

 which were made to Stonv Mountain and Bird's Hill. 



Prof. A. P. Coleman, in a paper on the extent of the 

 ice sheets in the Great Plains, pointed out tliat while 

 boulders from the .Arch.Tcan region to the east are spread 

 over the great plains as far west as Calgary, further to 

 the west an older drift, derived from the Rocky Mountain 

 region, is met with, this sometimes passing below the eastern 

 drift. In places boulders from the eastern drift are found 

 stranded 5000 feet up on the sides of the Rockv Moun- 

 tains. These Prof. Coleman believes were stranded from 

 ice-dammed lakes at a time when the Rocky Mountain 

 region stood at a lower level than it does at present. 



Glacial geology \\'as further represented bv a patier by 

 Dr. .\. Strahan, on the clacial geologv of .South Wales ; 

 bv a lantern lecture by Dr. A. R. Dwerryhouse, on the 

 glacial geology of Britain, as illustrative of the work of 

 the committee on erratic blocks, and bv the report of the 

 committee for the investigation of the fossiliferous drift at 

 Kirmington, Lincolnshire, and elsewhere. 



(3) Economic Geology. 



This subject, as might have been expected, was well to 



the fore, a series of most interesting papers on the ore 



deposits of Canada being given bv Canadian geologists. 



Prof. W. G Miller dealing with the gold, silver, and iron 



