LINNEAN SOCIETY OF LONDON. XXI 



that sea-port, and his collections of shells and corals afforded the 

 child some of his earliest and favourite playthings. A schoolboy 

 at the Eev. S. Sayer's academy, one of the amusements of the 

 vacations was the arrangement and the study of the species of the 

 paternal museum ; so that when young Broderip proceeded to 

 Oxford, to be matriculated at Oriel College, he took with him, in 

 addition to that basis of sound classical knowledge, in forming 

 which Sayer had so high a reputation, a larger amount of zoolo- 

 gical knowledge than perhaps any member of the learned Univer- 

 sity at that time possessed. 



Dr. Buckland, who then (1809) was Eellow and Tutor of Corpus 

 Christi College, wrote of Broderip, in a letter now in his son's 

 possession, " In my earlier years of residence at Oxford I took 

 my first lesson in field geology in a walk to Shotover Hill with 

 Mr. "William John Broderip, of Oriel, whose early knowledge of 

 conchology enabled him to speak scientifically on the fossil shells 

 in the Oxford oolite formation, and of the fossil shells and sponges 

 of the greensand of the Vale of Pusey near Devizes, as to which 

 he had been instructed by the E-ector of Pusey, Mr. Townsend, 

 the friend and fellow-labourer of Mr. Wm. Smith, the father of 

 English geology. The fruits of my first walk with Mr. Broderip 

 formed the nucleus of my collection for my own cabinet." 



The value of an early cultivation of Natural History has rarely 

 been exemplified in a more striking degree than in the conse- 

 quences of this collision of congenial minds, and in the splendid 

 results which may be attributed to the stimulus which the special 

 knowledge of the undergraduate gave to the Fellow of Corpus, 

 who subsequently became the famous Professor of Greology in the 

 University of Oxford. 



The son and biographer of Dr. Buckland has remarked that 

 " in after years Mr. Broderip was associated with Dr. Buckland on 

 the closest terms of family friendship and intimacy ; and he ren- 

 dered him the greatest assistance in his scientific labours, more 

 especially in the revisal of the earlier editions of his ' Bridgewater 

 Treatise.' " 



Mr. Broderip, besides his proficiency in the classical and dia- 

 lectic studies of Oxford, of which the influence is manifested in 

 his subsequent writings, attended the anatomical lectures of Sir 

 Christopher Pegge, and the chemical and mineralogical lectures of 

 Dr. Kidd. 



After taking the degree of B. A. he proceeded to London, entered 

 at the Inner Temple, and commenced the study of the law in the 



