Bather : Dates of Piihlication. 



191 



far as this is concerned, he may be left to the reproaches of his 

 own conscience ; the omission is not one of very general 

 interest. We pass to the question that really is of importance 

 to all workers in the branches of science with which you deal. 



Conceding to Dr. Dwerryhouse the interpretation which he 

 gives, and overlooking his own inconsistency, the fact remains 

 that the part in question hears no date of publication whatever. 



In July 1896, a circular was issued by a Committee of the 

 British Association, which I had the honour to serve as Secre- 

 tary, saying inter alia that ' it is the general opinion of scientific 

 workers .... that each part of a serial publication should 

 have the date of actual pubhcation, as near as may be, printed 

 on the wrapper.' (It may be mentioned that more than one 

 copy of this circular has been addressed to the Editor of the 

 Yorkshire Geological Society). What was the general opinion 

 in 1896 had become, one hoped, the universal opinion of scien- 

 tific workers in these days of bibliographies and international 

 catalogues. One regrets, however, to observe that there are 

 still a few exceptions, though it is not often that any is found 

 bold enough to defend his anomalous position in public. Let 

 us briefly examine the arguments for that position. 



I have not received permission to publish the considerations 

 addressed to me by Mr. Lower Carter, nor can I be certain that 

 Dr. Dwerryhouse is in entire agreement therewith ; but to 

 judge from what has been published by the latter gentleman, 

 it appears that he would consider the date of reading a paper to 

 be of more importance than the date of its publication. From 

 the point of view of the individual author, that date, or better 

 still, the date on which his MS. was sent in to the Secretary of 

 the Society, has no doubt a predominant importance, as proving 

 that he has not cribbed his matter from a paper that may have 

 been published before his, but at a later date than the sending 

 in of his MS. Since this seems to be the point of view most 

 sympathised with by Dr. Dwerryhouse, it is curious that he 

 should have omitted to give the date of reading in the case of 

 all but one of the six papers contained in the part for which he 

 is responsible. It is true that a prolonged search through the 

 ' Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geolotjical Society ' has enabled 

 me to attach dates of reading to two m.ore, but we have not all 

 the time to give to this fascinating study, nor indeed is the 

 question of the shghtest importance to anyone beyond the 

 original author and his hypothetical plagiarist. 



1908 May I. 



