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servation, and his residence in the Northumbrian coal-field. The 

 appearance of this useful and desirable work, was a long time de- 

 layed, owing to the difficulty, I regret to say, of procuring a suffi- 

 cient number of subscribers. Three fasciculi have, however, now been 

 brought out ; and in an ensuing number we shall be presented with 

 an explanation of the general views of the authors. The serious ob- 

 stacles which oppose themselves to the elucidation of this obscure 

 path in our inquiries, in many cases requiring a perfect acquaint- 

 ance with existing species of rare exotic and tropical plants, must 

 be appreciated by every one who has laboured in the same field ; 

 and working geologists, who are compelled, in the absence of 

 such instruction, to obtain data by slow and imperfect means, are 

 called upon warmly to support those, who, like Messrs. Lindley and 

 Hutton, have thus come forward to lighten their labours. The zeal 

 of Mr. Witham in this department, and his ingenious method of 

 assisting inquiry into the true characters of fossil wood, have been 

 already noticed by my predecessor ; and, as other naturalists seem 

 inclined to interest themselves in this pursuit, we may say that fossil 

 botany is at length taking root among us. 



In mineral conchology, that most important branch of our fossil 

 evidences, the year has not passed over without its fruits ; and 

 those who know the devotion which Miss Benett has bestowed upon 

 this study, and how largely she has thereby contributed to the 

 successful progress of Sowerby's text-book of the science, must 

 have witnessed with sincere pleasure the appearance of the organic 

 remains of Wiltshire, as collected and illustrated by that accom- 

 plished lady. 



I must now advert to those works of a more comprehensive cha- 

 racter, which have been produced in the last year by Fellows of this 

 Society. The English student in geology had so long felt the want 

 of a practical work, which should embrace and systematize all the 

 well authenticated data on which the science is founded, that the 

 warmest thanks of every one of its cultivators are due to Mr. De la 

 Beche, for the ability and perspicuity with which he has compress- 

 ed them into a portable volume, entitled ' The Manual of the 

 Geologist.' Nothing short of this compendious and instructive 

 digest, in which, without losing sight of general principles, the 

 author has endeavoured to adhere to the impartial rule of suum 

 cuique, was to have been expected from the pen of so experienced 

 and acute a geologist ; and so eager is the demand of the public for 

 a really good work on this subject, that a second edition has been 

 called for, and is already published. 



In noticing the appearance of the second volume of the " Principles 

 of Geology," I cannot but feel my inability to do justice to the merits 

 of a work, which, in the powerful language of the late Professor of 

 Mineralogy in the University of Cambridge, has been termed the 

 " Dynamics of Geology." 



As a fellow labourer with Mr. Lyell in France and the North of 

 Italy, when the first idea of this arduous task began to germinate in 

 his mind, I hope to be excused from the charge of vanity on my own 



