Editorial Notes. 531 



above proposed provision of funds, Fellows are reminded that, after 

 the completion of vjoI. Ixxvi (1920), they will not be entitled to receive 

 the Quarterly Journal regularly unless a subscription at the rate of. 

 10.9. j)er volume is paid in advance, along with their annual contribu- 

 tion to the Society. Those Fellows who do not require the complete 

 series can obtain separate parts at the price of 3s. each, if applied 

 for within one year of the date of issue. 



We have been informed that a proposition is on foot — between the 

 Trustees of the British Museum and the Treasury — to revise the 

 present scale of salaries for assistants now entering the British 

 Museum so as to render them more in accordance with those in 

 other branches of the public service and remove the difficulty which 

 at present prevents many able men, with University training, from 

 offering themselves as candidates for vacancies now actually existing 

 in the staff of the Natural History Branch. We trust that, in addition 

 to a larger initial salary about to be offered to new men who may 

 apply for these vacant posts, the salaries of those older men now 

 upon the staff will also he increased so as to render them more in 

 in accordance with the changed circumstances of living in 1920-1, 

 from which all ^persons with fixed pre-Wa-r incomes are suft'ering 

 mostly without hope of relief. 



The ninety-seventh annual report of the Whitby Literary and 

 Philosophical Society contains, among other matter of local interest, 

 an excellent article by Mr. J. T. Sewell, entitled " Notes on the 

 Geology of Whitby Sands ". The rapid erosion of the boulder- 

 clay cliffs west of Whitby is known to many, and even the writer 

 of the i^resent note, in the course of a not very long life, has witnessed 

 some remarkable changes. But the variations that have taken place 

 on the beach are perhaps of equal interest, and much more difficult 

 to detect. Mr. Sewell has made minute and detailed observations 

 on the spot for thirty years, recording any exposure of rock due to 

 temporary removal of the sand and gravel by tides, waves, and 

 currents, especially during storms, and he has thus accumulated an 

 unrivalled acquaintance with the details of this particular stretch 

 of foreshore. Some useful information was also acquired during the 

 building of the pier extensions. The results are presented in a couple 

 of large-scale maps, 12 inches to the mile, which show, among 

 other things, that both piers rest on Lias shale. It is also very 

 interesting to find that Mr. Sewell's observations lead him, with 

 apparently good grounds, to doubt the existence of any fault in 

 Whitby Harbour. This paper is an excellent example of the way 

 in which the long-continued and careful observations of a geologist 

 living on the spot may serve to correct the hasty generalizations of 

 those not possessing the local knowledge so necessary in work of 

 this sort. 



