Rev. A. Irving — Reply to Prof. Hull. 561 



to do, as any impartial and unprejudiced reader of my paper can see 

 for himself. I can assure Prof. Hull that I did not begin with any 

 dire design of smashing to pieces the beautiful tripod image of a 

 "Paleozoic Trias," which the great Murchison set up for the vene- 

 ration of geologists, and for which the learned Professor seems to 

 have a lingering affection ; the conviction, not only of its meaning- 

 lessness, but of its mischievous fertility in confusion of ideas, grew 

 upon me gradually as I went on with the subject. As it is, one 

 cannot fail to read with some satisfaction Prof. Hull's own admission 

 that he is " almost inclined to concur that there is but little evidence 

 to support the view of a threefold division of the Permian beds " 

 (p. 493). So much for the general drift of my paper. 



I now come to matters more of detail which Professor Hull has 

 touched upon. In the first place he says that I " quote his name as a 

 supporter of the view that it {i.e. the Sandstone of the Vale of Eden) 

 is of Permian age." My reply is that I liave not quoted Prof. Hull's 

 name in this lomj ; nor do I fear to challenge him to show a single 

 passage in my paper in which I have connected his name directly 

 with the " Sandstone of the Vale of Eden." The only three occasions 

 in which his name is mentioned in any such connexion are in the 

 two paragraphs, in the earlier part of the paper, the one beginning, 

 "It is no wonder that such special pleading . . . ," the other, "In 

 Siluria there is much vague talk . . . ." In these three cases I have 

 been studiously guarded in the use of language, out of consideration 

 both for Prof. Hull's susceptibilities and for my own wish to put things 

 in the truest possible light. What I do say is (a) that "It [i.e. the 

 triple classification of the Permian System as put forth by Murchison) 

 was adopted by Prof. Hull in a paper read by him before the Geo- 

 logical Society of London," and I give the reference to this paper, 

 Q.J.G.S. vol. xiv. This statement any one can verify therefore for 

 himself by a simple act of reference. (6) Nearly a page further on 

 I say, " The classification put forward by Murchison still finds 

 favour in some quarters ; and quite recently so high an authority as 

 Prof. Hull has proposed it for the acceptance of the British Com- 

 mittee." Prof. Hull has surely been caught here " reading the spirit 

 of the commentator into the text." The readers of the Geol. Mag. 

 are doubtless capable of giving to language its natural construction, 

 and will hold me responsible only for my ipsissima verba, not for 

 another person's version of my statements. On this latter point the 

 question therefore narrows itself to the categorical answer to be 

 given to the question : " Did Prof. Hull, or did he not, propose the 

 threefold classification (after Murchison) of the Permian System for 

 the accej)tance of the British Committee ? " ^ 



Prof. Hull states " that the evidence (as to the particular horizon 

 of the Sandstones of the Vale of Eden upon which Murchison rested 

 his claim) was rather of an inferential and indirect nature ;" and so 



^ On referring to the original document I find ttat the "Upper Sandstone of 

 St. Bee's Head " is mentioned expressly hy Professor Hull as a part of the " Upper 

 Permian." 



DECADE II. — VOL. IX. — NO. XII. 36 



