92 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
The English coal-fields are, of course, most especially dealt with — the Scotch 
coal-fields being somewhat briefly treated by Mr. J. Geddes, and those of 
Ireland by Professor Hull. The vast amount of practical information con- 
tained in this the first volume of the Report, shows at once the great value 
of the results which have been brought about by the Coal Commission. We 
learn that we have an accessible supply of coal that will last about 276 
years, but after that the coal that will remain could never be worked except 
under conditions of scarcity and high price. As we approach this exhaus- 
tion, the country will by slow degrees lose the advantageous position it now 
enjoys in regard to its coal supply; for although other countries would 
undoubtedly be in a position to supply our deficiencies, it may well be 
doubted whether the manufacturing supremacy of this kingdom can be 
maintained after the importation of coal has become a necessity. It is to 
be regretted that the Commission express rather an adverse opinion as to- 
the finding new coal formations, &c. 
The T oraminifera of the Chalk of Gravesend and Meudon. — Professor 
Rupert Jones and W. K. Parker, M.D., F.R.S., have been publishing some 
work together, with a review of Professor Ehrenberg’s researches on this 
subject; this paper is of peculiar value, but is too technical for further 
abstract. — Geological Magazine , November. 
Death of Sir R. Murchison. — Geology has sustained a severe loss — a loss 
indeed which it would be difficult to calculate — in the death of Sir Roderick 
Impey Murchison. Although at the ripe age of eighty years, it is a loss which 
geologists and geographers are alike called upon to mourn. “In relation 
to both these sciences, he has for many years justly occupied the most pro- 
minent positions. But, apart from his high social and scientific standing, 
he was a man full of genial and kindly feeling, who could be readily ap- 
proached ; and those who knew him most intimately acknowledge that he 
was never known to fail his friends in the hour of need, but was ready to> 
aid them with his advice, his influence, and his purse, as many a young 
scientific man amongst us can testify. Bom at Tarradale, in Ross-shire, he 
receive his early education as a boy at the Grammar School at Durham.”' 
The work that he has done is enormous ; the titles alone occupying several 
pages of the “ Geological Magazine.’’ 
The Irish Coal-measures. — Mr. G. H. Kinahan, of the Irish Survey, read 
a paper on this subject before the Royal Geological Society of Ireland. 
This communication was a reply to a statement made before the Society in 
January last, in a paper “ On the Ballycastle Coal-field,” by Mr. E. Hull, in 
which it is asserted that there were true coal-measures in Connaught, while 
none exist in the provinces of Munster or Leinster, as laid down in the Geo- 
logical Maps published under the direction of the late Mr. J. B. Jukes. The 
author of this paper showed that the coal-measures of Leinster, Munster 
and|Connaught, were identical ; therefore, if Mr. Hull’s statement respecting 
Connaught was correct, his assertion as to Munster and Leinster must be 
WTong. He pointed out that the late Mr. Foot and himself wished to divide 
the coal-measures into four series, but that the late Mr. Jukes objected, and 
stated, “ If we were to seek to force these coal-measure series into a strict 
analogy with those of other districts, we might look upon these lower black 
shales with marine fossils as the representatives of the upper limestone shale 
