654 REPORT— 1903. 



other nations find it wortli theii' while to do, and then, when the opportunity of 

 selection arises, they are able to choose such regions as will most rapidly fill up 

 and soonest yield a return for the private or public capital invested in them. 



Summary. 



To sum up, I consider that the time has come when geologists should make 

 a firm and consistent stand for the teaching of their science in schools, technical 

 colleges, and universities. Such an extension of teaching will of course need the 

 expenditure of time and money ; but England is at last beginning to wake up to 

 the belief, now an axiom in Germany and America, that one of the best invest- 

 ments of money that can be made by the pious benefactor or by the State is that 

 laid up at compound interest, ' where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt,' in the 

 brains of its young men. 



This knowledge has been an asset of monetary value to hosts of individuals 

 who have made their great wealth by the utilisation of our mineral resources, and 

 to our country, which owes its high position among the nations to the power 

 and importance given to it by its coal and iron. It is surely good advice to 

 individuals and to the State to ask them to reinvest some of their savings in 

 tlie business which has already given such excellent returns, so that they and we 

 may not be losers through our lack of knowledge of those sources of energy which 

 have made us what we are, and are capable of keeping for many years the position 

 they have won for us. 



And in our present revival of education it would be well that its rightful posi- 

 tion should be given to a science which is useful in training and exercising the 

 faculty of observation and the power of reasoning, which conduces to the open-air 

 life and to the appreciation of the beautiful in nature, which j)laces its services at 

 the disposal of the allied sciences of topography and geography, which is the hand- 

 maid of many of the useful arts, and which brings about a better knowledge 

 and appreciation of the life aud growth of the planet that we inhabit for a 

 while, and wish to hand on to our descendants as little impaired in vitality and 

 energy as is consistent with the economic use of our own life-interest in it. 



The following Papers and Reports were read : — 



1. The Geology of the Country round Southjyort. 

 By J. LoMAs, A.R.C.S., F.G.S. 



Looking towards Southport from the sea we notice three platforms rising in 

 gigantic steps towards the east. 



The first is low, varying in height from 9 to 20 feet above Ordnance datum, 

 and is fringed on the seaward side by sandhills which rise to an elevation of from 

 50 to 90 feet. On the north the broad estuary of the Ribble separates this plain 

 from a similar platform known as the Fylde district, and the Mersey on the south 

 cuts off another fragment which forms the north end of the Wirral. Two less 

 significant streams, the Douglas and the Alt, flow across the platform into the 

 Ribble Estuary and the Crosby Channel respectively. 



The whole of this plain is the gift of the Irish Sea glacier, which formerly 

 overrode the district, the solid rocks only reaching the surface in the case of a few 

 islands, while the bulk is below sea level. 



In the immediate neighbourhood of Southport, Keuper marls occur. These arc 

 of great thickness, and contain bands of gypsum and pseudomorphs of rock salt. 

 To the north, in the Fylde district, where similar rocks occur, salt is obtained from 

 the beds, and the boulders of gypsum which occur in great profusion in the local 

 drift have evidently come from this formation. 



The Bunter rocks of the Trias succeed to the east, and are in places capped by 

 Keuper sandstones. Where these occur we reach the second platform. 



At Ormskirk, distant about eight miles from Southport, several interesting 

 sections show the Keuper resting on the Upper Bunter. At Scarth Hill, near thq 



