© Blackwell Science Ltd, GEOLOGY TODAY, September–October 2000/179

leaving ‘type and figured specimens’ on a coast vul-nerable to both waves and nasty, wicked collectors. Itis like archaeologists discovering a priceless treasureand then abandoning it, exposed to the elements andfor all to see – and take.

Fossils are abundant at Hook Head. As stormspeel off more bedding planes, further examples willcome to light. Doubtless the same applies to BooleyBay. When this happens, is it too much to hope thatstaff from Irish institutions will actually get out anddo some rescue collecting for once? This would bebetter than sitting in their ivory towers and stirring upmoral panics every time the inevitable happens andsomeone else does the collecting instead.

STEPHEN MORETON33 Marina Avenue

Great Sankey, WarringtonCheshire WA5 1HY

Singing songs of stonesI’ve been meaning to send in the words of ‘We sing asong of stones and rocks, …’ for ages, but now some-one has beaten me to it! ( Geology Today, v.16, p.123,2000). It is indeed a song, to be sung to the tune of‘Keep those wheels a-turning’, and I too learned itfrom Albert Ludford whilst I was a student at Luton.I was under the impression that it had been written bya group of students at Albert’s university, which Ibelieve was Birmingham. Albert is still alive (at leasthe was a few weeks ago) and may be able to confirmthe source.

MARGARET FOXMountain Ash

Spittal Square, ArlecdonFrizington CA26 3UU

Dry stone walls take a dipThe photograph of dry stone walling with inclinedcourses on page 130 of the last issue of Geology Today(v.16, 2000) looks like the current (foreset) beddingcommon in deltaic sandstones. It reminds me of an-other example. Way back in my student days at Shef-field University, in 1950, virtually the whole geologydepartment (three staff and three final-year students)took the bus to a Yorkshire Geological Society meet-ing in Barnsley. We were joined on the bus by thethen retired Professor Fearnsides, who entertained usby pointing out the various places where he had beenconsulted by the pre-War coal mining companies. Inbetween these, he pointed out several examples of‘current bedding’ in short lengths of dry stone walls.These, he said, were due to their having been builtacross the margins of areas where mine workings hadlater subsided. As one section went down extracourses were added to bring the wall tops up to thesame level as the unsubsided sections, giving a cur-rent bedding effect for a few yards.

TREVOR D. FORD21 Elizabeth Drive, Oadby

Leicester LE2 4RD

The French connectionI was very interested to read Richard Gosnell’s letter(Geology Today, v.16, p.61, 2000) about the use ofthe grade system centred on the Paris Meridian onthe margins of Institut Geographique National(IGN) maps in France. Bureau de RecherchesGéologiques et Minières (BRGM) sheet lines for its1 : 50 000 geological maps are still based on this sys-tem, in a similar fashion to the British GeologicalSurvey (BGS) use of the Ordnance Survey one-inch3rd series index for its maps of England and Wales.However, the latest BRGM 1 : 1000 000 (6th edi-tion) national geological map (Geoscientist, v.7, part5, p.25, 1997) uses degrees relative to the Greenwichmeridian and its 1 : 250 000 map series is also basedon this system along the same lines as those pro-duced by the BGS. Indeed, even Michelin has forabout the last 10 years gone over to this system on its1 : 200 000 series. So the only way of determiningthe exact coverage of more detailed IGN maps is torefer to its own well-drawn 1 : 100 000 series, whichcovers France in 74 sheets.

While the IGN has two-kilometre grid systems,even a fairly senior member of the survey could notrefer me to a index map of France showing thesegrids at 100- or 10-km intervals. That said, I havejust seen new 1 : 25 000 sheets with a GPS receiverkilometre-grid printed over the map in blue, but Iwas puzzled that the conventional kilometre-grid in-tersections marked on these two nearby maps of theMassif Central (Chaine des Puys – 2531 ET andMonts du Cézallier – 2543 OT) referred to differentsystems! Unfortunately, the French public are notvery familiar with the concept of grid references, andso geological guide books are filled with long pas-sages trying to navigate the reader between outcropson an itinerary. This even extends into many Frenchscientific papers, so that locations are referred to interms of the commune (administrative parish) theyare in, or a nearby D road (departmental), oftenwithout the aid of a well-drawn location map. How-ever, this habit is creeping over the Channel, as canbe seen, for example, in recent issues of the Journal ofthe Geological Society, where many papers now don’tmark geographical coordinates on their figures or usethem to refer to locations in the text and tables. It isthus much harder to piggyback on published re-search to apply your own supplementary techniquesto the same outcrops. In a few cases, I do realize thatthe exact location should not be published, althoughthis should be stated in the paper and the sensitiveinformation lodged with a relevant society or na-tional survey; but this does not excuse this worryingtrend.

DAVID NOWELL2 Tudor Road

New BarnetHertfordshire EN5 5PA