£06 Prof. Necker on the History and Progress of Geology* 
rapidly fructified ; the domain of the tertiary formations has 
been extended ; Mr Webster has discovered them in the basin 
of London ; Messrs Constant Prevost and Beudant, in that of 
Vienna in Austria ; Messrs Beudant, Perussac, and Omalius 
D’Halloy, in several parts of France ; Messrs Brocchi and 
Brongniart, in the sub-appenine hills of Italy, and the subalpine 
ones of Piedmont, the Verronese and Vicentine; but with local 
differences sufficiently marked, to induce us to think with M. de 
Ferussac, that the tertiary formations present no general rule in 
the order of superposition of their strata, and that each basin 
has its peculiar formations. 
At the same time, the engineers of mines of France have been 
labouring at the mineralogical statistics of the different depart- 
ments ; and we expect, from the zeal of the French geologists, 
soon to see the mineralogical geography of that kingdom, as well 
known as is at present that of England. 
The long-continued controversy between the Neptunians and 
Volcanists, regarding the origin of the basaltic and trap-rocks, 
turned from its original point of view, whether by the influence of 
the systematic ideas of Werner, or by the partial manner in which 
the volcanist geologists had looked upon the problem, appears 
to be drawing towards an end. In fact, the question has un- 
dergone a decided change, since the time when the school of 
Werner supported the aqueous origin of these rocks, and the 
identity of the mode of their formation with that of the second- 
ary strata containing shells ; and when the volcanists, misled by 
the frequent association of basalt with scoriform and porous la- 
vas, regarded them as true currents, which had issued from the 
crater of a volcanic cone, and had run at the surface of the earth, 
or beneath the waters of the sea ; since the moment, when mi- 
nute mineralogical distinctions, which experience has since proved 
to be as useless as they were subtile, separated the basalts and 
porphyries produced by fire, from those which were acknow- 
ledged to be of aqueous origin. 
At that time the remarkable phenomena, noticed in Scotland 
by Hutton, Playfair and Hall, were unknown, or rather, asso- 
ciated with a theory of the earth, otherwise inadmissible, they 
had made but a feeble impression ; and the volcanic phenomena, 
known only from the external appearances of Vesuvius and Et- 
