Remeivs — Close's Glaciation of Ireland. 167 



were published by tbe author as abreast with the science of the time, 

 will of necessity do him a great injustice. The volume was out of 

 print, and could not be had for love or money. A reprint was 

 wanted — a verbatim reprint of the first edition would have been 

 valued by every one, when it was impossible from age and health 

 for the author to undertake a thoroughly revised edition. Our love 

 and great respect for Charles Maclaren, who, though he had had a 

 rough life, battling for political freedom, was the very impersoni- 

 fication of mildness and gentleness, and who, as we knew him 

 within the last ten years, was to our mind, in appearance, in manners, 

 and in conversation, a model philosopher ; our love and respect for 

 him have compelled us thus strongly to condemn the way in which 

 this work has been reproduced, which, however well meant, will we 

 fear do injury to the fame of its distinguished author. 



TV. — The General Glaciation of Ireland. 



By the Eev. Maxwell H. Close. 



[Read before the Eoyal Geological Society of Ireland, March 14, 1866.] 



THIS pamphlet contains a very elaborate explanation, partly 

 founded on personal observation, of the primary glaciation of 

 Ireland by means of a general ice-crust, or ice-flow, with occasional 

 remarks on secondary glaciation by " district glaciers." The author 

 may be said to have done for Ireland what Mr. Jamieson has done 

 for Scotland. While referring the main form of the ground to 

 marine denudation, he attributes to ice the smoothing, furrowing, 

 and ridging of the sister Isle, both by denudation and accumulation. 

 He clearly shows the distinction between what are locally called 

 " drumlins" and " eskers," the former consisting of straight and 

 parallel ridges of gravel, with blunted and scratched blocks, whereas 

 the latter are irregular as regards direction, and are composed of 

 water- sorted materials. The pamphlet is well worth a careful 

 perusal. 



Geological Society of London. — I. February 20, 1867. — Waring- 

 ton W. Smyth, Esq., M.A., F.E.S., President, in the chair.— 1. "On 

 the British Fossil Oxen." — Part II. Bos longifrons, Owen. By 

 W. Boyd Dawkins, Esq., M.A. (Oxon.), F.G.S. 



The author analyzed the characteristics usually assigned to Bos 

 longifrons, and concluded that there were none of specific value to 

 separate it from the smaller varieties of Bos Taurus. The large 

 series of skulls in the Dublin and Oxford Museums show that Bos 

 frontosus of Nilsson is a mere variation from the more usual type. 

 Professor Owen, on the faith of its occurrence on the Essex shore, 

 along with the remains of extinct animals also washed up by the 

 waves, ascribes to this species a Pleistocene age. This inference, on 

 a ligid examination of the premises, turns out to be faulty, and there 

 is no evidence anywhere in Europe that it co-existed with any of the 

 extinct mammals, the Irish elk being excepted. It is very commonly 



