THE 



aEOLOGlCAL MAGAZINE. 



NEW SERIES. DECADE II. VOL. V. 



No. I.— JANUARY, 1878. 



I. — Eeoent Pkogress in Paleontology. 



Being the Inaugural Address delivered before the Edinburgh Geological Society at 

 its 44th Anniversary Meeting on the 27th November, 1877. 



By H. Alleyne Nicholson, M.D., D.Sc, F.R.S.E. ; 

 Professor of Natural History in the University of St. Andrews, and Swiney Lecturer 



on Geology. 



SINCE its foundation as a Science, at the beginning of this century, 

 by the illustrious Cuvier, Palajontology has progressed with an 

 astonishing rapidity ; and though theoretically belonging to the 

 twin sciences of Zoology and Botany, its domain is now so vast, and 

 the number of facts which it has accumulated is so great, that it has 

 every claim to rank as a distinct department of knowledge, which 

 cannot be fully mastered excejot by those who make it the subject 

 of special study. That the number of these is daily increasing is 

 shown conclusively by the increased number of systematic works on 

 Paleontology which have appeared of late years, and not less by 

 the character of these. Two of these treatises, both as yet but 

 partially published, may be singled out for mention in this con- 

 nexion — namely, the " Handbuch der Palseontologie " by Professors 

 Zittel and Schimper, and the new " Letheea Geognostica " by an 

 association of German palaeontologists. The former of these, if carried 

 out with the fulness and accuracy which distinguish its first portion, ' 

 will be one of the most valuable and important treatises on system- 

 atic paleeontology which we possess in any language, and will be 

 a fitting companion to the classical treatises of Pictet and D'Orbigny, 

 though it will not supersede either of these honoured works. Of 

 the second of these only the first part, embracing the Atlas of 

 Plates of Palaeozoic fossils, has as yet been issued ; but if the text be 

 equal to the plates, and if the various sections of the work are under- 

 taken by men as eminent as Ferdinand Eoemer, the new " Lethasa 

 Geognostica " will undoubtedly form an indispensable item in the 

 library of every working palaeontologist. 



If it be the Germans whom the student has to thank for these 

 new systematic treatises, it is to the English-speaking races that we 

 owe the latest attempts to reduce the present chaotic condition of 

 palasontology to order, by establishing a bibliography of the science, 

 and by the preparation of catalogues of the fossils of particular 

 formations or of particular countries. In carrying out the first of 

 these ends, the successful foundation of the " Geological Eecord " 

 must be regarded as a great step in advance. In this invaluable, 



DECADE II. VOL. V. — NO, I. 1 



