188 Proceedings of the Madras Literary Society 



finr.Q of these curious bodies. He will find the interior structure of the 

 numxnulite described in Sowerby's Mineral Conchology in the Library.* 



Oriental Club, London, 2Qth March, 1844. 



My Dear Fkasek, 



It is many, many years since we met, but it is unlikely that you should 

 have either so entirely lost sight of me, that all recollection of me or of my 

 career should have entirely escaped you. 



The subject of the accompanying Memorandum, of which I send you 

 r. few copies, has excited considerable interest in this quarter of the 

 world. Wherevfcr boulders have been found in Europe, they have been 

 considered as productions foreign to the localities where they now exist; 

 and they are by some believed to have been brought to their present situ- 

 ation by ice-bergs, while the land was still submerged below the ocean ; 

 while others ascribe them to the ordinary consequence of rolled masses of 

 rock hurried along by the force of aqueous currents. The glacial theory 

 has in Europe many converts; but such a theory, to which I among others 

 do not yield my assent, must be shaken if we should find that the bould- 

 ers in India present the same peculiarities as those of Europe, namely, 

 as to shape and difference of geological structure from any very contigu- 

 ous rocks or hills. 



General Morrison, with whom I was speaking on this subject three nights 

 ago, conceives the boulders to be mere detached or fallen pieces of conti- 

 guous hills, which have assumed their present shapes from the effects 

 of climate. To adopt this opinion, we must first have proof of the con- 

 struction of the boulders, and any contiguous rocks being identical (and of 

 which specimens alone can show) ; and also it must be demonstrated that 

 the elements acting on sharp masses will have the effect of rendering them 

 round (as if they had been submitted to rotatory attrition.) I have no 

 theory on the subject, but we want well attested facts from eye-witnses- 

 es, with their opinions if they choose to give them, to enable geologists in 

 Europe to come to some more satisfactory conclusion than has, I think, 

 yet been arrived at. 



I am not aware whether among your other scientific pursuits, you have 

 included geology as one of them ; but this I feel certain that whenever 



* These -when examined under a very powerful microscope by a member of the Com- 

 mittee (Captain Worster) proved to be nothing more than minute spherical bodies com- 

 posed of concentric lamellar coats formed round a nucleus in the centre. Several speci- 

 mens of the chert were ground down, so as to give sections of them in every possible 

 direction, and they uniformly presented the same series of four or five concentric rings, 

 without any appearance of organic structure whatever. Drawings of these were for- 

 warded to Captain Newbold. 



