Xl PROCEEDIN'GS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



to form a body of sound observers by greatly increasing the staff of 

 the geological survey. The augmentation amounts, in all, to 33 

 assistant geologists, viz. 21 for England, 6 for Ireland, and 6 for 

 Scotland ; whilst the organization has been modified by the appoint- 

 ment of a separate director for Scotland, Mr. Archibald Geilde, 

 Prof. Eamsay and Mr. Jukes retaining, as before, their control over 

 the surveys of England and Ireland respectively. 



Under these directors, Messrs. Aveline and Bristow have been ap- 

 pointed " district surveyors " for England, Mr. Du Noyer for Ireland, 

 and Mr. Hull for Scotland. 



Out of the total number of fresh posts, only 19 have as yet been 

 fiUed up, the requirements of the Civil Service examination having 

 kept back some candidates who, in other respects, were well qualified ; 

 and as most of the number are necessarily new to the work, it is 

 not to be expected that any great advance in the amount of surveys 

 completed can be looked for until a couple of years, at least, have 

 been allowed for instruction and practice in the field. 



In spite of the obstructions opposed to industry in Italy by the 

 excitement and lavish expenditure of the recent pohtical situation, 

 it is consolatory to learn from Florence that arrangements have been 

 made for the establishment, in connexion with the ministry of Agri- 

 culture &c., of a Committee for the preparation of a great Geolo- 

 gical Map of Italy, with an organization similar to that of the 

 geological commission of Portugal. Sign. Igino Cocchi, whose fre- 

 quent attendance at our meetings will be remembered by the Society, 

 is charged with its direction, and Messrs. Meneghini, Gastaldi, and 

 Pasini are his colleagues. Several works of interest have lately 

 proceeded from the pen of some of those eminent cultivators of 

 natural science, among which I will only refer to the description of 

 the Ammonites of the Lias by Meneghini, in the ^ Palaeontology ' of 

 the Abbe Stoppani, and to the discussion of the Tertiary and super- 

 ficial deposits of the Upper Yal d'Arno and the Yal di Chiana, by 

 Cocchi *. 



The discovery in these beds, at a place called the Olmo, near 

 Arezzo, of a human skull of great size and peculiar type, attaches to 

 them a high importance in connexion with the antiquity of man. 

 The conclusions of the Italian geologist are sufficiently startling to 

 rouse the attention and call for the corroboration of other observers. 

 The exhumation of the skull, at 15 metres depth, from a lacustrine 

 deposit in a deep railway-cutting was fortunately witnessed by 

 Cocchi and others ; and his examination of the neighbourhood leads 

 him to infer that it lay quite at the base of the Postpliocene form- 

 ation, beneath remains of ElepJias primigenius, Cerviis euryceros. 

 Bison prisms, and other extinct mammals, that it was buried in 

 the mud of a lake which existed at a time when the surface -contour 

 of the country was extremely different from the present, and that, 

 in fine, man existed in the Prsgglacial period. 



Another conclusion of much interest has been arrived at by the 



^- " L'Uomo fossile nell' Italia centrale, di Igino Cocclii," Memorie della 

 Soe. Ital. di Scienze naturali. Milano, 1867. 



