President's Address. 
39 
1879.] 
The work of the Marine Survey under Captain Taylor, I. N., is still 
greatly restricted by the want of a proper vessel, and until the steamer now 
being built at Bombay is completed, it is not possible that any important 
additions can be made to our knowledge of the Indian seas. Meantime, 
however, some most useful charts have been published, and several harbours, 
roadsteads, and tracts of the coast have been surveyed. For a knowledge 
of the true contour of the sea bottom in the neighbourhood of India, and 
for the investigation of all the interesting problems in geology and zoology 
that may be solved by means of the sounding lino and dredge, we must still 
wait for the new vessel, which I am happy to say will be fully provided 
with the necessary apparatus, and which, in the hands of Captain Taylor 
and Lieut. Jarrad, may be expected to add to the magnificent series of dis¬ 
coveries due to the “ Challenger” expedition. The seas of India are as 
yet untouched, and as the country itself has had a peculiar and exceptional 
geological history, it is not improbable that the depths of the surrounding- 
ocean may harbour many forms of life not existing in the other oceanic 
tracts. Some of those curious questions as to the course of the great 
oceanic currents, questions upon which, undoubtedly, the distribution of 
temperature and rainfall largely depends, may receive their solution in an 
area where access from one polar region is entirely barred, and thus the con¬ 
flicting effect of two sources of cold water is not present, as in the Atlantic 
and Pacific Oceans, to disturb the observations made. 
The subject of deep-sea dredging is one to which the attention of the 
Society was first directed several years since, and the Council has never ceased 
to urge the importance of it. It may be hoped that there is at last a pros¬ 
pect of useful exploration. For geological purposes and for comparison 
with the marine fossils of the tertiary formations, a series of the inverte- 
brata and especially of the mollusca, echinoderms and corals of the Indian 
seas is essential, and for much aid in obtaining such a collection we look to 
the Marine Survey. 
The field work of the Geological Survey for the past year has not been 
very prolific in results of interest, and, as in the larger field of the Trigono¬ 
metrical Survey, the importance of the work is due chiefly to its being part 
of a connected system. Some valuable additions have been made to our know¬ 
ledge of Kashmir, Hazara, Bannu and some other portions of the Punjab, 
Kumaun, Rajputana, Chutia Nagpur, Kattywar, the Godavari valley, Tan- 
jore and the islands of Ramri and Cheduba, but in no case are the details such 
as greatly to alter the conclusions previously formed. The only published 
number of the “ Memoirs of the Geological Survey” contains a paper by 
Mr. Ball on some previously unexplored coal-fields in Palamau (Palamow), 
and of this paper the interest is rather practical than scientific, although some 
interesting details are given as to the distribution of certain lower Gondwa- 
