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POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
REVIEWS. 
THE PHYSICAL GEOLOGY AND GEOGRAPHY OF GREAT 
BRITAIN.* 
EOLOGY is as yet an infant science, but nevertheless an infant of 
prodigious size. From a few tangible and undoubted facts, geolo- 
gists have been able to deduce as it were a great scheme, the history of the 
world’s life. It consists, no doubt, in great part, of speculations and 
theories, many of which, in the advance of science, may prove false ; but 
by continual observation and unwearied perseverance we are gradually 
arriving at the truth. 
Scarce fifty years have passed since William Smith, “ the father of 
geology,” laid the basis on which all modern discoveries have been founded, 
and what was once considered a useless and “dry” study, now interests 
not only the learned in science, but all classes of society, who are eager to 
obtain some knowledge of the structure and nature of the world they 
inhabit. The Government has for two or three years past — with great credit 
to itself — encouraged a taste for science among the working classes, by 
evening lectures from the professors in Jerrnyn Street, and the crowded 
benches of the lecture-hall show how well their efforts have been directed. 
A course of six lectures on the physical geology of Great Britain, lately 
delivered to working men by Professor Ramsay, and ably reported by 
Mr. Mays, is now before us. The subject is treated in a manner 
at once interesting, instructive, and worthy of the President of the Geolo- 
gical Society. The way in which the connection between the scenery and 
geography with the geology of our island is shown, forms one of the chief 
merits of Professor Ramsay’s course. Those who have listened to the 
course, or read the report, cannot fail to find a new interest in the country 
around them. Go they to the mountains of Wales, the Highlands of Scot- 
land, the downs of the English south coast, or the plains of East Anglia, — 
all have a fresh beauty ; each valley tells its tale of denudation by some 
roaring sea, or elsewhere by a mountain torrent ; here is evidence of a 
mighty iceberg, there the course of a great river. A pleasure before 
unknown is now found in climbing the hills of Worcestershire, or the 
noble pass of Llanberis ; for Professor Ramsay tells us something about 
each, as he opens to our view the waves that long since surged on Malvern’s 
sides, and the glaciers slowly grinding out their road among the mountains 
* “ The Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain.” A Course 
of Six Lectures delivered to Working Men in the Museum of Practical 
Geology, Jermyn Street, by Professor A. C. Ramsay, President of the 
Geological Society. London : Stanford, 
