184 JReports and Proceedings — Geological Society of London. 



for some years watched and appreciated the conscientious and painstaking labour 

 by which Miss Donald has accomplished a very admirable piece of work, it is 

 particularly gratifying to find that this work has met with the appreciation of the 

 Council of the Geological Society. 



As Miss Donald cannot be present to receive this award personally, perhaps I may 

 be allowed to read an extract from her letter : — 



"Will you thank the President and Council most heartily on my behalf for the 

 great honour which they have conferred by awarding to me the balance of the 

 proceeds of the Murchison Fund. The news came tome as a great surprise, for 

 I had previously deemed it no small honour- that my papers should have been 

 considered worthy of publication in the Quarterly Journal of the Society, and this 

 higher recognition will certainly prove an encouragement to further research and, 

 I hope, better work. My studies have been a source of great pleasure to me, and 

 I feel that there is still much to be found out, even with regard to the genus 

 Murchisonia, to which I have hitherto devoted the greater share of my attention." 



The President tben handed the Lyell Medal (awarded to 

 Dr. Wilheliu Waageu, F.G.8., of Vienna) to Dr. W. T. Blanford, 

 for transmission to the recipient, addressing him as follows : — 

 Dr. Blanford,— 



Owing to ill-health. Dr. AVaagen is unable to be present to receive the Lyell 

 Medal, with the sum of twenty-five pounds, which the Council of the Geological 

 Society have awarded to him, in appreciation of his excellent Palseontological work. 

 Just twenty years ago (Feb. 1878) Dr. Waagen was a recipient of the Lyell Fund, 

 soon after his retirement, owing to ill-health, from the Geological Survey of India ; 

 and his work was, on that occasion, referred to in terms of great admiration by the 

 then President, Prof. Martin Duncan, and by Dr. Oldham, who was deputed to 

 receive the Award on his behalf. Of the works published by Dr. Waagen, I may 

 mention an important paper, "On the Classification of Upper Jurassic Beds" 

 (those of Southern England included) in 1865, and in 1869 one on " The Subdivisions 

 of Ammonites," of which full abstracts appeared in the Quarterly Journal of the 

 Geological Society in 1865 and 1870. When in India he described the Ammonites 

 of the Kach Jui-assic beds, and his great knowledge of the Ammonitidte enabled him 

 to work out the succession in detail. Another most important work was his 

 description of the fossils from the Cambrian, Carboniferous, Permian, and Triassic 

 of the Salt Eange in the Panjab, and his accoimt of the geology in the " Palseou- 

 tologia Indica." His untiring devotion to his work is well known to all those who 

 have been in any way associated with him, and his careful and zealous labours have 

 placed him in the front rank of palseontologists. I now ask you to be good enough 

 to forward to Dr. Waagen this further token of esteem, with every expression of 

 good- will, from the Council of the Geological Society. 



Dr. Blanford replied in the following terms : — Mr. President, — 



I am glad that I am able to comply with the request of my old friend and colleague 

 Dr. Waagen, that I would represent him on this occasion and receive for him the 

 Lyell Medal of the present year. 



May I be allowed to express my own gratification at the award ? Few geologists, 

 I think, will question the value of the Palseontological work done in connection with 

 the Geological Survey of India since that Survey was first organized under the late 

 Dr. Thomas Oldham. Dr. Waagen is now the only survivor of the first three 

 Palaeontologists who between them occupied the post from 1862 to 1883. As, 

 moreover. Dr. Waagen has been continuously engaged in the study of Indian 

 Palaeontology, and in contributing to the Survey publications, from the date when 

 he first joined the Indian Survey to the present day, he is the author of a much 

 larger share of the work than either of his colleagues. 



As you, Su-, have already stated, the proceeds of the Lyell Fund were awarded to 

 Dr. Waagen just twenty j'ears ago, in 1878. There has rarely, I believe, been an 

 occasion on which the iatentions of the great geologist who founded this fund have 

 been more thoroughly carried out. Sir Charles LyeU desired that the interest of 

 this fund should be given for the encouragement of Geology or of any of the allied 

 sciences by which Geology has been most materially advanced. At the time when 

 the fund was awarded Dr. Waagen had left India, broken in health, and in serious 



