40 Dr. Fitton's Notes on the History of English Geology. 



4 tractors and others, who came to undertake the work, what 



* the various parts of the canal would be dug through. But 

 4 the great similarity in the rocks of oolite, on and near the end 



* of the canal toward Bath, required more than superficial ob- 



* servation, — to determine whether those hills were not com- 

 4 posed of one, two, or even three, of those rocks, as by the di- 

 4 sanctions of some parts seemed to appear. These doubts 

 4 were at length removed by more particular attention to the 



* site of the organized fossils, which I had long collected. 

 4 This discovery of a mode of identifying the strata by the 

 4 organized fossils respectively imbedded therein, — the sharp- 

 4 ness of those in their primitive sites, contrasted with the 

 4 same fossils rounded and water-worn in gravel, led to the 



* most important distinctions; which at once seemed to clear 

 4 away the rubbish and common stumbling-blocks in geology. 



" Thus stored with ideas, which J knew not how to make 

 4 publicly or privately useful, on being introduced to Dr. An- 



* derson, then at Bath, and to the Rev. Benjamin Richardson, 



* and the late Rev. Joseph Townsend, I was induced by the 

 4 late Mr. Davis to make known to them some of my dis- 



* coveries. Dr. Anderson pressed me for a map and somege- 



* neral account of the stratification of England, to publish in his 



* Recreations on Agriculture, and sent me the first and second 



* parts of that work : but getting into a variety of business, in 

 4 draining land, &c. in remote parts of England and Wales, 



* my correspondence with the Doctor ceased, without my com- 

 4 plying with his wishes. — 1 became intimately acquainted with 

 4 the two other gentlemen, and opened my mind fully to them ; 

 4 and at the Rev. J.Townsend's house drew up the first tabular 

 4 account of the order of strata, with the organized fossils by 

 4 which they are respectively identified, in all the hills around 

 4 Bath. From hence the information spread like a circle upon 

 4 water ; for my two sanguine friends thought remuneration for 



* my discoveries was sure to follow the publicity of information 

 4 so useful and important. I found, however, I had still to 

 4 work my way, against that stream of difficulties which must 



* ever attend the pursuit of such objects by a man like me, 



* who had not property sufficient to publish it. 



" The utility of such discoveries in draining and otherwise 

 ' improving land, induced some gentlemen of the neighbour- 

 4 hood to put them to the test. This new occupation threw me 

 4 in the way of T. W. Coke, Esq., who, during his stay at Bath, 



* visited the agricultural improvements on Thomas Crook's 

 4 estate at Tytherton, where I was employed. From hence I 

 4 went into Norfolk ; and thence soon after to Woburn, where 



I conceived the complete drainage of Prisley Bog, the site of 



