The publications of the 600th Number of the Geological Magazine completes fifty years of its existence, and the Editor gladly avails himself of the occasion to express to his numerous friends and colleagues his most cordial thanks for their unfailing and generous support since 1864. Without their aid he would have been on many occasions at a loss to sustain the difficult task of providing for the monthly issue of the Magazine through so many years.

It is very gratifying to the Editor that the Rev. Osmond Fisher, M.A., F.G.S., Sir Archibald Geikie, K.C.B., P.P.R.S., F.G.S., Professor W. Boyd Dawkins, M.A., D.Sc., F.R.S., and Professor Edward Hull, M.A., LL.D., F.R.S., F.G.S. (who represent the contributors to the 1864 volume) have sent him letters of congratulation on his Jubilee; for, alas! by far the larger number of the early friends and supporters of the Geological Magazine have “joined the majority”. The ranks of the geologists have, nevertheless, maintained their strength, as will be seen by a reference to the retrospect of the work in the forty years from 1864 to 1903, in which a splendid record is furnished of geological and palæontological contributions, summarized by the late Horace B. Woodward and the Editor. The subsequent decade (1904–14) has been no less prolific in good work. Indeed, one may venture to maintain that the quality of the contributions in these later years has been distinctly in advance of those preceding them; whilst the illustrations have increased very greatly both in numbers and excellence.