﻿XCviii PEOCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [May I908, 



vations which they deemed worthy of permanent record. Among 

 these contributions some have taken a notable place in the history 

 of the growth of geology. As a rule, like those on the geology of 

 our own country, they exemplify the guiding principle on which the 

 Society was established, that hypothesis and theory should as far as 

 possible be discountenanced, and that attention should mainly be 

 given to the ascertainment and registration of the actual facts of 

 nature. Erom the Continent of Europe there came the memoir of 

 Strangways on Russia,^ which so usefully opened a way for the 

 subsequent work of Murchison, De Yerneuil, and Keyserling. Scrope 

 sent his observations on the Ponza Isles and the volcanic district of 

 Naples.^ Buckland and De la Beche supplied papers on the rocks 

 of the Riviera coast.^ I^yell described what he had seen among 

 the Cretaceous and Tertiary strata of the Danish islands of See- 

 land and Moen.^ Leonard Horner communicated the account which 

 his sojourn at Bonn enabled h^ to prepare of that district of 

 Rhineland.^ 



But perhaps the most memorable papers oq foreign geology 

 which appeared in the Transactions were the joint contributions 

 of Sedgwick & Murchison. The great monograph which contained 

 the results of their explorations in the Eastern Alps was a bold 

 pioneering attempt to unravel the complicated structure of that 

 mountain-chain.'^ Still more epoch-making was their memoir 'On 

 the Distribution & Classification of the Older or Palaeozoic Deposits 

 of the North of Germany & Belgium, & their Comparison with 

 Eormations of the same Age in the British Isles.' ^ The Devonian 

 System, which the two authors had successfully established in this 

 country, was recognized and traced by them over a large part 

 of Central Europe. They were able to detect the Continental 

 equivalents of the English subdivisions, and thus to place, in its 

 true strati graphical position, a large portion of the ancient and 

 still undefined domain of the Grauwacke. The progress of research 

 since their day has, of course, greatly extended and improved their 

 work ; but the broader features of the Devonian System in the 

 region over which they were traced by these two leaders remain 

 essentially the same, and the name ' Devonian ' has become a 

 familiar term in the geological nomenclature of all parts of the 

 world. 



1 Trans, ser. 2, vol. i, p. 1. '^ lUd. vol. ii,- pp. 195, 337. 



3 Ihid. vol. iii, pp. 171, 187. * Ihid. vol. v, p. 243. 



°' Ihid. vol. iv, p. 433. ^ Ihid. vol. iii, pp. 301-420. 

 7 Ihid. vol. vi, p. 221. 



