54 8 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



[Sept. 28, il 



Professor de Lapparent thought that the very important 

 event of man's appearance justified the separation of 

 the period from the Tertiary. 



M. Gaudry, the great French vertebrate palaeontologist 

 of Paris, also would separate the Quaternary from the Ter- 

 tiary, the former being the present epoch in its fauna. As 

 the Primary era was that of invertebrates, then that of 

 fishes, the Secondary of cold-blooded reptiles, the Terti- 

 ary ot warm-blooded mammalia and birds, so the 

 Quaternary is the epoch of the domination of man. 



Professor Sacco, of Turin, in support also of the 

 Quaternary, adduced the argument that a great movement 

 of the earth's crust and a change of climate had taken 

 place between the Pliocene and Quaternary. 



Dr. Blanford agreed with M. Renevier in rejecting the 

 term Quaternary, and joining the latter to the Tertiary. 

 The introduction of the personal element, the appear- 

 ance of man, into the question was to be regretted. He 

 pointed out that in Asia the Tertiary was naturally 

 divided into two great series, an inferior marine of 

 2,500 feet of eocene and miocene, and a superior terres- 

 trial or freshwater series of deposits of 10,000 feet thick- 

 ness from the Pliocene to the present day. 



Professor Gosselet, of Lille, as an additional argument 

 in favour of Quaternary, instanced the great development 

 of fluviatile conditions and erosion of great valleys. 



Professor Renevier objected to the importance at- 

 tached to the appearance of man alone ; besides, man 

 probably appeared in the pliocene and perhaps before. 

 No new organic type characterised the Quaternary. 



Dr. John Evans was in favour of possessing a term to 

 indicate the human period, without giving it an absolute 

 value as compared with other epochs. 



Professor de Lapparent added to his former remarks 

 the following geological reasons for Quaternary : — The 

 foraminiferal and nummulitic accumulations charac- 

 teristic of the Tertiary ; the great explosive volcanic 

 phenomena of the Quaternary following the fissure 

 eruptions of the Tertiary ; and, finally the extraordinary 

 development of glacial conditions in the Quaternary. 



Professor Pilar, of Agram, supported the use of 

 Quaternary as equivalent to anthropozoic, and of the 

 same importance as casnozoic, mesozoic, and palaeozoic. 

 The President, Professor Prestwich, agreed with Pro- 

 fessors Gaudry and Lapparent in adopting the special 

 term Quaternary. What is of importance in history, he 

 said, is not the long periods of time but great events, 

 and the appearance of man was one of these. In addi- 

 tion to this, there were the production of cosmic pheno- 

 mena and an important change of climate. He adopted 

 for this quaternary period the term Pleistocene, and con- 

 sidered it as beginning with the base of the forest-bed, 

 the epoch of the appearance of the last fauna, and the 

 introduction of the present climate. It will thus be 

 seen that Professor Prestwich uses Lyell's term Pleis- 

 tocene, but separates it from the Tertiary. 



On Friday the Chairman, in opening the proceedings, 

 informed the Congress that an invitation, endorsed by all 

 the American geologists attending the Congress, had been 

 received from the City of Philadelphia for the holding of 

 the next Congress (that of 1891) at Philadelphia. 



The invitation was accepted by acclamation. 



M. Hanchecorne then submitted to the Congress the 

 first proof of a section of the international geological map 

 of Europe, the preparation of which was decided upon at 



the Bologna Congress. The map is drawn on the scale 

 of 1 to 1,500,000 from the most recent topographical 

 documents furnished by the different nations. The geo- 

 graphical part of the work was done between the meet- 

 ings of the Bologna and Berlin Congresses. The geo- 

 logical divisions traced on the sheet submitted to the 

 Congress by M. Hanchecorne were adopted conformably 

 to the decisions arrived at by previous Congresses. By 

 the principle adopted with regard to the colouring, 

 each great group is represented by one particular 

 colour, and the different subdivisions by various 

 shades of the same colour. The deeper colours have 

 been chosen for the most ancient formations, a single 

 exception being made in the case of the coal measure*, 

 which, according to long established custom, are coloured 

 black. For the volcanic rocks it has been found neces- 

 sary to vary the tints adopted according to the differ- 

 ences of age and of chemical composition (acid or basic). 

 The sheet submitted, which was only a proof, and which 

 was open for further improvements, bore twenty-four 

 different shades of colours for the sedimentary rocks, 

 three for the Archaean formations, and nine for the 

 volcanic rocks. 



Professor Prestwich, in the nime of the Congress, 

 presented his thanks and congratulations to the com- 

 mittee which had had the map in charge for the remark- 

 able piece of work which they had submitted. 



The discussion on the crystalline schists was then 

 resumed. 



Dr. Hull, on behalf of Mr. Kilroe, of the Geological 

 Survey, presented some rocks from county Donegal re- 

 markable for their double schistosity. The mica flakes 

 were disposed in two main directions, in relation with two 

 distinct periods of metamorphism. Dr. Hull, speaking 

 for himself, cons dered, as a fundamental question in 

 the study of metamorphism, the distinction to be estab- 

 lished between the results of mechanical agencies and 

 hydrothermal agencies. The former had determined 

 the foldings, cleavages, etc., and the latter the formation 

 of new mineral combinations. Mechanical movements 

 had assisted those combinations, but they had not pro- 

 duced them. 



Dr. Sterry Hunt enumerated the three principal hy- 

 potheses proposed for the explanation of the origin cf 

 the gneissic rocks. One predominant fact was the dis- 

 tinction of different stages of crystalline schists and cf 

 their constant regular succession from the fundamental 

 gneiss to the uppermost crystalline schists. 



M. Gosselet believed that the metamorphic rocks of 

 the Ardennes ought to be attributed to mechanical 

 agencies ; they could not be connected with the pheno- 

 mena of contact. He differed fron the opinions ex- 

 pressed by M. Lory. If, in the Ardennes, the more 

 markedly broken and folded rocks were less crystalline 

 than those which were slightly curved or horizontal, it 

 was because, in the first case, pressure had produced a 

 mechanical operation, and, in the .second case, the 

 mechanical operation had been converted into heat. 

 Crystallised minerals, therefore, owed their origin to the 

 action of overheated water contained in the rock. 



Mr. Blake, in describing the crystalline schism of 

 Anglesey, insisted on the action of pressure. The effects 

 of pressure could not be misunderstood, and it was 

 even possible to distinguish the effects of static 

 pressure (schistosity) from the effects of dynamic pres- 

 sure (false schistosity) when these two effects were 

 successive. 



