W. W. Watts — British Geological Fhotographs. 31 



VI. — British Geological Photographs. 

 By W. W. Watts, M.A., F.G.S. 



AYEAE ago, by the decision of the Council of the British 

 Association, there was sent to the Museum of Practical 

 Geology a large collection of photographs mainly taken with a view 

 of illustrating, in the most permanent and unbiassed waj'^ at present 

 possible, the features and phenomena of geological interest in the 

 United Kiogdom. The project of forming such a collection 

 originated with Mr. 0. W. Jeffs in 1888, when he read a paper 

 on the subject at the British Association at Bath, in which he 

 pointed out the utility of such a collection and the necessity for 

 forming it. When a committee was appointed in the following 

 year he undertook the management of the work, and he has carried 

 it on for seven years with indefatigable industry and scrupulous 

 care, only relinquishing it when the size of the collection began 

 to exceed the capabilities of private control, and when his own lack 

 of leisure no longer permitted him to devote the requisite time and 

 attention to its custody. Twelve hundred photographs had been 

 acquired by 1895, and it was then thought advisable that the 

 collection should be lodged in the Library of the Museum of 

 Practical Geology, where it would be available for reference by 

 all those who wished to make any real use of it. 



The year that has just elapsed has been occupied in cataloguing 

 and rearranging the collection so as to make it more easy of access 

 and reference. This has been rendered possible by the adoption of 

 self-binding mounts of standard size (15^ in. by 12 in.), which can 

 be shifted into different portfolios as required. The work is now 

 far advanced towards completion, but the necessary remounting 

 of the earlier part of the collection is a matter of time and expense, 

 so that it may not be quite finished even within the present year. 

 Still, the most valuable part is that which is being dealt with first ; 

 and only those districts which are already well illustrated, and even 

 in some cases over-illustrated, are being left until a later period. 



It has been thought worth while at this stage to publish some 

 account of the purposes of such a collection, to describe the character 

 of what has been already brought together, and to indicate the 

 directions of future development; for it must at once be stated that 

 finality has been by no means reached yet, and there is a great deal 

 of work which ought to be completed in the next few years before 

 the whole country will be well illustrated, and before, so to speak, 

 sufficient capital has been created to enable the collection to exist 

 on its average income. 



The objects of the collection can soon be stated. It is obvious, 

 in the first place, that it is well to have geological phenomena of all 

 sorts photographed : pictures so taken, under proper precautions, are 

 entirely trustworthy ; the personal element can hardly enter into 

 them, and they as a rule present the bare facts denuded of the halo 

 of interpretation. A paper by Mr. Cope Whitehouse on Fingal's 



