542 Menry Woodivard — Address to the Geologists' Association. 



afterwards jointly carried on by Messrs. Salter and Hicks, lias since 

 been admirably worked out by Mr. Hicks alone (as regards the 

 geology and palEeontology), save in the matter of the GraptoUtes ; 

 these having been carefully investigated by Mr. John Hopkinson, 

 r.Gr.S., and also studied by Prof. James Hall, of Albany, U.S.A., 

 when visiting England last year, and tend to throw important light 

 on the age of these beds. 



Our esteemed Vice-President, Prof. Morris, has given us another 

 valuable aid to our knowledge of the older Palfieozoic rocks in the 

 concise and clear summary he has furnished to Salter's Catalogue of 

 the Paleeozoic Fossils in the Woodwardian Museum at Cambridge. 

 In that table we are supplied with a Concordance to the classifications 

 of Sedgwick, Murchison, Jukes, Lyell, Phillips, and the Geological 

 Survey ; and thus one of the great stumbling-blocks to students is 

 removed by his sure and experienced hand. It is confidently to be 

 hoped that Sedgwick's classification (though late in receiving its 

 just award) may now commence to be recognized and taught, and 

 this is the more likely from the able manner in which Prof. T. Sterry 

 Hunt has argued the case between Murchison's Silurian and Sedg- 

 wick's Cambrian claims.^ 



II. — Pal^^ontology. 



(a.) PalcBopJiytology. — Much important work has been done in 

 Fossil Botany during the past year by Williamson, Heer, Carruthers, 

 Binney, Thiselton Dyer, and others, a record of which has annually 

 been drawn up by Mr. Carruthers, and published in the Geological 

 Magazine (see October Number, p. 461). 



In a subject like palajophytology, much time must necessarily be 

 taken up in re-investigating doubtful points ; for even where plant- 

 remains are abundant, it is most often the case that the organs of 

 fructification, upon which a really reliable determination might be 

 based, are entirely absent, and, as pointed out by Bentham, Carru- 

 thers, and Wilson Saunders, orders of plants, totally diverse in cha- 

 racter and distribution, have often identically shaped foliage, and it 

 is upon fossil leaves most generally at least in the Neozoic forma- 

 tions that the botanist has to base his determination. . 



And here it may be desirable to explain how, notwithstanding 

 this apparent insuperable difficulty, Professor Oswald Heer and 

 other botanists have succeeded in their determination of Miocene 

 "and other plant-remains in so a remarkable a degree. If we study 

 the indigenous Flora of any district, we shall find that it is made up 



some Fossils from the Menevian Group, ibid. vol. ixiv. p. .510 ; ibid. vol. xxv. p. 51. 

 •'On the Ancient Rocks of St. Davids Promontory," by II. Hicks and Prof. Hark- 

 ness, and "Descriptions of New Species," by H. Hicks, ibid. 1871, vol. xxvii. p. 

 384. "On some Undescribed Menevian Fossils," by H. Hicks, ibid. vol. xxviii. 

 p. 173. "The 'I'remadoc Rocks of St. Davids," by IJ. Hicks, ibid. 1873, vol. xxix. 

 p. 39. " On the Classification of the Cambrian and Silurian Rocks," by Henry 

 Hicks, Prnc. Geol. Association, 1873, vol. iii. p. 99. 



^ "History of the Names Cambrian and Silurian," Geol. Mag. 1873, Vol. X. 

 pp. 386, 453, 504, etc. ; see also the " Canadian Naturalist," now series, vol. iv. 

 p. 281, etc. 



