Geological Society of London. 181 



The President next presented the Balance of the Wollaston Fund 

 to Mr. VV. A. E. Ussher, F.G.S., and said :— 



Mr. Ussher,— In connexion with the Geological Surrey of the counties of 

 Somerset, Devon, and Cornwall, it has been your province to examine many of 

 the rocks exposed, and in addition to your official work you have contributed several 

 useful accounts of the Palaeozoic, Triassic, and Pleistocene deposits to the Journal of 

 this Society and to other geological publications. In recognition of the good work 

 done by you the Council have authorized me to present you with the balance of the 

 Wollaston Donation Fund. 



Mr. Usshek, in reply, said :— I thank the Council for the recognition of work this 

 Award implies, and you. Sir, for your allusions to it. "Whatever results I may have 

 obtained in the discharge of my ordinary duties on the Geological Survey are not 

 deserving of reward. The construction of maps may be faithfully performed without 

 obtaining results of moment in the furtherance of geological knowledge ; official 

 requirements are so engrossing and imperative as to oblige those who, like myself, 

 desire to acquire as competent an acquaintance as possible with the strata on which 

 they are employed, to supplement, by private work, the information acquired in 

 public duty. The results obtained by private investigation, whensoever they con- 

 tribute to the advancement of our common science, are in themselves rewards. 



The result of my twenty years' experience in geological mapping is this: — the 

 acquirement of patience and the entire subordination of theoretical considerations, 

 which should be the outcome of a careful study, collation and comparison of details, 

 and not the working hypothesis to weld them into system during or before the pro- 

 gress of the work. 



This principle I have had to keep in view in Pleistocene work, in dealing with a 

 variable and disturbed series of Triassic rocks, and to a still greater extent in dealing 

 with fossiliferous rocks such as the Lias, Oolites, Carboniferous, and Devonian. I 

 have learned the extreme importance of Palaeontology in investigating disturbed 

 Palaeozoic areas, where it appears to me that the evidences of fossils and of strati- 

 graphy should be taken together, and without subordinatiug the one as a mere 

 adjunct to the other. 



In presenting the Balance of the Murchison Geological Fund to 

 Mr. E. Wethered, F.G.S., the President addressed him as follows: — 



Mr. Wethered,— 'The remainder of the Murchison Donation Fund has been 

 awarded to you by the Council of this Society on account of the researches yon have 

 undertaken into the microscopic structure of sedimentary rocks, and to aid you in 

 prosecuting further inquiries. The results of your examination of the insoluble 

 residues obtained from the Carboniferous Limestone, and of the remarkable minute 

 tubular forms (apparently organic) from various limestones, that you have ascribed 

 to Girvanella, are of great interest, and have furnished an important contribution to 

 our knowledge of the manner in which Palaeozoic and Mesozoic limestones have been 

 formed. 



Mr. Wethered, in reply, said : — I desire to express to the Council my thanks 

 for the honour done me in making me the recipient of the Murchison Fund for the 

 year. This kind consideration will greatly encourage me in pursuiug that branch of 

 geological research which I have marked out as one of the objects of my life. To 

 have done work which merits the acknowledgment of this Society — the first in the 

 world— is one of the greatest satisfactions a geologist can enjoy. 



You have referred to my work on the microscopical examination of limestones, and 

 I should like to say that in this there is a most important field open for investigation. 

 If those who have the opportunity of examining the oldest limestones would do so 

 through the microscope, with due regard in preparing the slides to the optical pro- 

 perties of the rock, my belief is that our knowledge of the life which existed at that 

 early period of the earth's history would be considerably advanced. 



I again return my thanks for the honour done me. 



The President then presented the Balance of the Lyell Geological 

 Fund to Mr. C. Davies Sherborn, F.G.S., and said :— 



Mr. Davies Sherborn, — There is no branch of scientific work at the present day 

 that confers a greater benefit on geologists in general than the recording of geolo- 

 gical and palaiontological literature. Owing to various causes, the mass of published 



