356 Notes and Comments. 



during the last retreat, can be seen resting, without having 

 produced more than a sHght superficial disturbance.' Thus 

 Professor Bonney shews us (and we accept his facts) that the 

 ice in Vaud and Geneva has been ' curiously inconstant in its 

 operations,' Why will he not allow the ice which once existed in 

 Britain to have acted similarly ? 



STRIATED SURFACES. 



On page 13 we find that ' so far as I am aware, rocks thus 

 affected [striated and polished] have not yet been discovered in 

 the Wirral peninsula. On the eastern side of England similar 

 markings have been found down to the coast of Durham, but 

 a more southern extension of land-ice cannot be taken for 

 granted.' From this it is pretty obvious that Professor Bonney 

 either does not care to read up the recent literature on a subject 

 which he looks upon as of such great importance, or he has wil- 

 fully ignored it. As has been described in several important 

 papers from 1876 onward, there are in the Wirral, acres in extent 

 of surfaces which are continuously striated. On the Yorkshire 

 coast, too, striated surfaces have been known for a quarter of a 

 century, and have been described by Lamplugh, Stather, 

 Kendall, Maufe and the present writer, in various papers. 

 Inland also they occur in considerable numbers, and have been 

 frequently mapped by the Geological Survey. Oddly enough, 

 one of the papers recording striated surfaces on the Yorkshire 

 coast is referred to in Professor Bonney 's ' Ice Work,' published 

 in 1896 ; but in his ' present attempt to separate facts from 

 fancies,' he has thought it expedient to ignore it. 



A HUDDERSFIELD WANDERER. 



One of Professor Bonney's ' facts ' which even the most 

 ardent glacialist would not have dared to have accepted without 

 very careful verification, is the record of rhomb-porphyry at 

 ^ Lockwood, near Huddersfield.' It is certainly not mentioned 

 in the paper referred to in the footnote to Professor Bonney's 

 note, nor is it in either of the British Association or Yorkshire 

 Boulder Committee's reports. Perhaps Professor Bonney will 

 give his data for the record ? If not, we must assume that as 

 he states on page 3, ' a statement of facts without mention of 

 an authority, means that I am speaking from personal know- 

 ledge,' the record is his own. With all due respect to his 

 petrological knowledge, we doubt the record. 



Naturalist, 



