322 
inquiring and judging for tbemselves, are apt to form an 
erroneous idea of the proceedings of the British Associ- 
ation, and to suppose, that unless some new and astounding 
revelations in scientific pursuits or mechanical inventions 
are propounded at each meeting, the institution has failed 
in its objects. I think, however, it deserves attention, 
that the chief utility of its proceedings consists not in the 
assemblage of its members, nor in the matters which are 
incidentally brought before the sectional meetings, but in 
the encouragement which it munificently affords to useful 
objects in the various departments of art and science. 
The investigations of the ablest scientific men are pursued 
from day to day and from year to year, with funds fur- 
nished by the Association, and its harvest of science is not 
to be looked for in its crowded meetings and hospitable 
re-unions, but in the volumes of its transactions, which are 
yearly printed, and in the promotion of useful objects effected 
through the influence of its recommendation. The subject 
of this paper is an example of the latter. The chart which 
I now produce, is engraved for and under the immediate 
superintendence of the Committee appointed by the British 
Association, and I doubt not that in this district, so rich 
in mineral productions and so rich in natural sections, many 
highly interesting copies of such sections will be prepared 
before the next meeting of the British Association. These 
sections will form an important and useful portion of the 
Museum of this Society, and if lent for a short time to the 
Museum of Economic Geology in London, copies of them 
will be made for that Institution. In order to draw atten- 
tion to the practical means of effecting these objects, I shall 
point out a few of the leading considerations which have had 
the attention of the Committee. 
In the first place, then, uniformity is an essential element 
in a collection so extensive as this will necessarily be, if 
