RECORDS 
OF THE 
GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF INDIA. 
Part 4.] 
1878. 
[ November. 
On the Gbogkaphical Distribution of fossil organisms in India, by Dr. W. 
Waagen. 
{With a Maj)). 
Bead at the meeting of the Mathematical and Natural Science Section of the 
Imperial Academy of Sciences, Vienna, l.st Decemher 1877. 
Translated ly R. Bruce Foote, f.g.s., Geological Survey of India. 
Although many facts relating to the geology of India have been made public 
through the labours of the Geological Survey of India and the activity of many 
non-professional geologists, there has been no work by which it was possible to 
obtain a view of what was known up to date, and the absence of any even 
approximately accurate general map has been a very sensible rvant in Indian 
geological Htoratiu-e. Greenough’s map was utterly useless, because perfectly 
untrustworthy; India, as shown in Marcou’s geological map of the woiid, is on 
much too small a scale to bo useful in more advanced discusslon.s. It cannot be 
my intention to remove this inconvenience thoroughly; to do that lies solely in 
Note .—The Geologioiil Survey of India has been specially unfortunate in prematurely losing the 
services of the two accomplished paleontologists wdio successively undertook the highest branch of 
its investigations ; as palaiontological researches, more than any others perhaps, demand a close 
acquaintance with an immense array of details, and the patient discussion of these from vsirious 
points of view that arc still, more or le.ss, dehatahle. We are therefore to be congratulated that 
Dr. Waagen has been able to bring together his rellectious upon the information he collected while 
his health permitted him to work in this country. This siiost recent essay upon the primitive 
geogi’aphy of India by a palajontological expert, is rc-iiroduced in our Itceords for the hciicfit of 
students who may not have access to the original paper. There are, as the author himself sur¬ 
mises, numerous small mistakes of geographical detail, etc.; hut as they do not affect the general 
purpose of the paper, they have been left uncorrected.—II. B. Medlicott. 
