• NOTES AND QUERIES. 
37 
fucoidal bodies. On this visit he discovered thiit these Sihirian slaty 
schists are underlaid by a Liugiila-bearing sandstone, of pi-obably the 
same age as the Potsdam sandstone of North Ameriea, and the 
Lingula- flags of Wales. 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
Communications from Colonists. — " In a community so small, so occupied 
with business, and in general so destitute of all taste for science, as a colonial 
town, where there are no men who combine the leisure and means with the 
inclination to foster scientific inciuiries, it is all up-hill work to the amateur in 
science. lie has no one to sympathize with and assist him in his difficulties, nor 
to share his triumph in success ; while, if engaged in professional duties, the 
public regard the time spent in his scientific pinsuits as worse than wasted. I 
have always observed the pid)lic are more tolerant of cards or billiards than of 
Geology or Botany. The appreciation of om labours at liome is the only reward 
we can look forward to. The colonial public is profoundly ignorant of and 
indifferent to science. I ^vish much that some means could be devised by which 
sucli (]_uestions as those we wish to submit to special Geologists, coidd be answered 
by emnient men, without du-ectly troubling them with letters, which I am quite 
sensible must be a great and unjustifiable tax on their valuable time. Many 
difficulties beset the early progress of the colonial Geologist in his science, which 
he has no means of getting over but by referring to Europe ; and he is often too 
straitened in means to aff'ord to pay for an analysis. Some years ago, a lengthy 
dispute, as to whether a given rock was igneous or aqueous, was terminated by 
sending home a specimen of it, which was pronomiced to be oxide of iron and 
quartz. In this case, certairdy, the disputants ought to have settled their argu- 
ment by an appeal to the blowjiipe ; but there are many cases in which the 
authority of eminent gentlemen of the scientific Societies at home would clear up 
difficulties, and encourage to further exertions. As I said before, men at home 
work with hope that their labom-s will lead to distinction ; here we have none to 
appreciate our researches. Now, apropos of the trouble, on the one hand, to 
eminent men of science, of questions on Geology and Mineralogy, and on the 
otlier desirableness of smoothing difficulties to tyi-os in science, by appeal to 
authorities at home, I should be glad to know if there be any way of asking these 
questions without unnecessaiy trouWe and inconvenience to those whose time is of 
so much value to themselves and to the scientific world in general. If not, and 
if any plan could be devisetl for institutmg a coiTCsponding secretary through 
whom information could be obtained, I am sure there must be many who, in 
connnon with myself, would be most happy to contribute towards the expenses 
attending such an institution. I fear sucli a suggestion may appear presump- 
tuous from so oljscure a collector as myself; but I have so long wished to hear of 
fossils, &c., I have sent home (some ten years at least), and the infonnation could, 
perhaps, have been given so easily by some members of the Geological or other such 
Society, tliat I have often wished for some such means of asking a question or two. 
One forgets and loses interest in specimens after lapse of years. — An Antipodean 
Colonist." — It is with sincere pleasure that we put our pages at the disposal of 
our countiymen in far distant lands : and tlie attention which we have already offered 
to give, and, in very numerous cases have given, to the specimens forwarded to us 
from our correspondents in the British Isles, we wdl, with equal readiness, extend 
to those forwarded us from any region, however remote, which the adventurous 
traveller or geologist might chance to visit or to reside in. We think, moreover, 
that this magazine would prove a valuable source for obtaining such knowledge and 
