Jfprts of Htffiitgs. 
GENEEAL. 
T he first meeting of the year was held on the evening of 
January 1st, when a paper was read by Professor 
Thompson on “ Hearing with Two Ears.” The conclusions 
arrived at by him were illustrated by various experiments with 
telephones. The subject attracted a considerable number of 
visitors as well as members, and the paper appears in full in the 
foregoing pages. 
The next meeting occurred on the evening of February 5th, 
when Mr. Chas. decks contributed a paper, entitled “A Few 
Thoughts on Darwinism,” which wdll also be found in the 
present Part. 
Professor Sollas followed with his paper on “ Evolution in 
Geology,” in treating of which he commenced by stating the 
views held by the earliest sect of geologists, viz., the Catastro- 
phists, who asserted that all changes in the crust of the globe 
were the result of convulsions of nature ; the granite having 
been formed from the molten earth, and the strata, according to 
them, deposited in regular succession. As directly disproving 
this theory, Mr. Sollas referred to the interruption of the strata 
along the river Avon. Next come the Uniformitarians, who 
attribute geological changes to the action of w’ater : the rain 
corroding the earth’s surface, and sw^eeping the debris into the 
sea, while the waves gradually disintegrate the coast. Denuda- 
