ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT. XXXl 



* Memoirs of the Geological Survey of Great Britain/ This is the 

 first volume only of a work which we must all hope will speedily be 

 followed by many more ; because they^'cannot fail to supply us with 

 a large body of facts, carefully collected by most competent observers, 

 which will not only make us more accurately acquainted with the 

 structure of our own country, of which a great part may be said to 

 be known to us as yet only in its principal outlines, but will ma- 

 terially aid in the determination of many of the great problems of 

 Geology. I consider the advantages to be derived from this new insti- 

 tution of our Government, in an economical point of view, important 

 as they w^ill be, subordinate to the higher objects of science it is 

 calculated to promote. 



In my Address of last year I adverted to the new importance that 

 had been given to this national establishment, instituted nine years 

 ago, and to the able men by whom the work is to be conducted. 

 With scarcely any exceptions, all geological inquiries have been the 

 fruits of individual research. From the extent of such inquiries, 

 every geologist working by himself, and endeavouring to make out 

 the structure of a country and describe the phaanomena in detail, 

 must labour under considerable disadvantages ; but in the Geo- 

 logical Survey of Great Britain, there is a combination of forces 

 which we have never, in this country at least, seen applied to the 

 promotion of any one department of science. No department per- 

 haps requires so many different descriptions of force to be brought 

 to bear upon it. The Ordnance Trigonometrical Survey led the way 

 by the preparation of that indispensable requisite in geological in- 

 quiries, an accurate Map on a large scale, so ably begun under the 

 direction of General Mudge, and not less ably carried on by his 

 successor General Colby — both early Fellows of this Society. For 

 the more general Survey we have geologists of great practical expe- 

 rience, who have established a high reputation ; and when the structure 

 of each region is to be worked out in detail, the special knowledge 

 of the mineralogist, the chemist, the natural philosopher, the zoolo- 

 gist, the comparative anatomist, the botanist, and the palaeontologist, 

 will be brought to bear, as required, by means of men of high au- 

 thority in each branch, and their labours will be illustrated by artists 

 of great skill, all attached to the Survey ; forming together a corps 

 of scientific men, for the accomplishment of a great work, not sur- 

 passed, I believe, by any similar establishment in any other country. 



The Journal of Mr. Darwin, as Naturalist in the Surveying Voy- 

 age of the Beagle, contained such an amount of new and important 

 information as to excite a universal admiration of his talents as an 

 observer ; and had he given us nothing more, he would by that work 

 have supplied ample evidence of his industry and zeal, notv/ithstand- 

 ing almost continual suff'ering from ill health for several years. But, 

 besides some separate memoirs, he has contributed to our science, as 

 you know, his valuable treatise on Coral Reefs, and that on Volcanic 

 Islands. These however had not exhausted his store, for during the 

 last year he has produced another volume of the highest interest, 

 his ' Geological Observations on South America/ containing in its 



