p 



ADDRESS 



BY 



SIR ARCHIBALD G E I K I E, 



LL.D., D.Sc, For.Sec.R.S., F.R.S.E., F.G.S., Director-General of the 

 Geological Survey of the United Kingdom, 



PRESIDENT. 



In its beneficent progress through these islands the British Association 

 for the Advancement of Science now for the fourth time receives a 

 welcome in this ancient capital. Once again, under the shadow of these 

 antique towers, crowded memories of a romantic past fill our thoughts. 

 The stormy annals of Scotland seem to move in procession before our eyes 

 as we walk these streets, whose names and traditions have been made 

 familiar to the civilised world by the genius of literature. At every turn, 

 too, we are reminded, by the monuments which a grateful city has 

 erected, that for many generations the pursuits which we are now 

 assembled to foster have had here their congenial home. Literature, 

 philosophy, science, have each in turn been guided by the influence of 

 the great masters who have lived here, and whose renown is the 

 brightest gem in the chaplet around the brow of this ' Queen of the 

 North.' 



Lingering for a moment over these local associations, we shall find a 

 peculiar appropriateness in the time of this renewed visit of the Asso- 

 ciation to Edinburgh. A hundred years ago a remarkable group of men 

 was discussing here the great problem of the history of the earth. 

 James Hutton, after many years of travel and reflection, had communi- 



B 2 



