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THE GEOLOGIST 



secondly, express a hope that the fact of the recognition of this body as 

 the " Royal Geological Society of Ireland" may incite the Fellows to still 

 further exertions in the cause of their favourite science. In conclusion, 

 the council desire to tender their most sincere thanks to Lord Talbot de 

 Malahide, to -whose kindness they consider themselves mainly indebted 

 for the successful issue to which their application has been brought. 

 They would also express their warmest acknowledgments to Mr. Hobert 

 Mallet, F.R.S., who, though no longer resident in Dublin, is still unremit- 

 ting in his interest in the society, of which he has been so long a distin- 

 guished member, and whose unceasing exertions in regard of this special 

 accession of dignity to it have at last been crowned with success : — 



" Whitehall, March 28, 1864. 



" My Lord, — I have had the honour to lay before the Queen the petition, 

 transmitted in your letter of the 17th instant, of certain members of the Geolo- 

 gical Society of Dublin, on behalf of that Society, and I am to inform your 

 Lordship that her Majesty has been graciously pleased to comply with the prayer 

 of the petition, and to signify her desire that the Geological Society of Dublin be 

 henceforth called 'The Royal Geological Society of Ireland,' and that the mem- 

 bers thereof be styled ' Fellows of the Royal Geological Society of Ireland.' I 

 am commanded by her Majesty to convey to the Society her thanks for the copy 

 of the Journal of their proceedings, forwarded by your Lordship, which has been 

 placed in the Royal Library at Windsor. — I have the honour to be, my Lord, 

 your Lordship's obedient servant, (Signed) " G. Geey. 



" The Lord Talbot de Malahide." 



Mr. Ormsby read a paper on "A Polished and Striated Surface in the 

 Limestone of Ross Hill, County Galway." On the Midland Railway, 

 between Galway and Oranmore, there is a low range of hills, over which 

 the line passes nearly at the surface of the ground. Some time since it 

 was thought expedient to lower the road here to improve the gradients. 

 When the surface clay was removed, a large portion of the top of the rock, 

 for upwards of three hundred yards in length, was found to be brightly 

 polished, grooved, and striated. Several borings were then made in the 

 fields on each side, and different results obtained ; but they all showed 

 that the surface of the limestone beneath was smoothed and polished over 

 a very considerable area. In various places in the rock were deep grooves, 

 as if a plough had been driven over it, the cuts having in some cases sharp, 

 jagged edges and a bold outline, — in others, soft, gentle slopes, like ripple 

 marks on a sandstone. These deeper grooves and the principal stria? 

 were in a direction nearly parallel to the railway, or magnetic east and 

 west, while a series of minor striatums run north-east and south-west. The 

 former seem to be due to the violent rubbing of ice. most probably in the 

 form of a glacier, and the latter may be ascribed to the subsequent action 

 of the drift. 



Mr. Jukes said that the society was indebted to Mr. Ormsby for the 

 care with which he had investigated the subject, to which his own attention 

 had been drawn by Mr. Ormsby in the course of last winter. He had 

 lately visited the locality himself, and he could only say that the pheno- 

 menon was much more striking on a large scale than could be supposed 

 from the inspection of a hand specimen. Surfaces fifty or sixty yards in 

 length were laid bare, quite smooth, and dipping at a uniform angle of 

 about half a degree. These smooth surfaces had been covered with clay, 

 and their appearance was very different from that of surfaces which had 

 been long exposed, showing how the erosive action of the air destroyed the 

 markings of the direct action of ice. He (Mr. Jukes) did not know whe- 



