Xlviii PROCEEDINGS OF THE aEOLOGlCAL SOCIETY. [May I9OI, 



THE ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS OE THE PRESIDENT, 

 J. J. Hareis Teall, Esq., M.A., V.P.R.S. 



The greatest loss that we have sustained during the past year is 

 one which we share in common with the nation and the world. Our 

 noble Q-UEEN Victoria, of ever-glorious memorj^ has passed away, 

 Robed in the simple splendour of her life. 



As a Society we have to deplore the loss of a past-President, two 

 Foreign Members, and many Fellows who have contributed to the 

 progress of geology during the Victorian era, now, alas ! for ever 

 closed. 



His Grace the late Duke of Argyll was too well-known in other 

 spheres of activity to render it necessary that we should record 

 the ordinary biographical details of his life in the pages of our 

 Journal. Born in 1823, he was elected a Eellow of this Society in 

 1850, and in the following year communicated his classic paper on 

 the Tertiary Leaf-beds in the Isle of Mull. The intercalation of 

 the plant-bearing strata with the sheets of basaltic lava was clearly 

 established in this communication, and thus a fact of vital importance 

 in connection with the chronology of the volcanic eruptions of the 

 Inner Hebrides was placed beyond dispute. 



The clearness and accuracy with which the details of this occur- 

 rence are described and illustrated, by pen and pencil, make one 

 regret that the numerous claims on his time by affairs of State and 

 by the duties connected with the administration of a large domain, 

 prevented him from following up a line of research for which he 

 was obviously so well qualified. 



His later communications were, for the most part, of a polemical 

 character. He stood out boldly as a champion of the older faiths 

 in opposition to the rapidly-growing ideas on such subjects as 

 Olaciation, Earth-Sculpture, and Evolution ; and it must be admitted 

 that on many occasions his keen critical faculty, combined with 

 his extensive knowledge, enabled him to find weak places in the 

 armour of his opponents, while his literary skill and great eloquence 

 often enabled him to drive home his attacks with striking efi^ect. 



The two addresses delivered during his presidency of this Society 

 are illustrations of his attitude towards the tendency of geological 

 thought at the time. He combated with great force the extreme 



