May, 1895. OBITUARY. 349 



Professor Dana was a Member of the Academy of Sciences of 

 Paris, a Fellow of the Royal Society, of the Academies of Berlin and 

 Munich. He received the Copley Medal in 1877, and the Wollaston 

 Medal of the Geological Society in 1872. 



As a naturalist, Professor Dana's work was characterised by the 

 grip of a master-mind. In the course of his long career he had to 

 undertake many very different and difficult tasks. In each of them 

 the same mental grasp of the principles of the subject was shown. 

 His great report on the Corals of the Wilkes' Expedition is the most 

 indispensable monograph on the Reef Corals. His classification of 

 the Crustacea, though artificial, is still used by zoologists. His work 

 on mineralogy was a masterly synopsis of the knowledge of the 

 science. His contributions to geology profoundly influenced contem- 

 porary thought on such problems as the formation of coral-islands, 

 the permanence of oceans and continents, and the characters of 

 volcanic action. In each of these Dana's mastery of his subject and 

 his powers of careful, detailed observation were exhibited. His work 

 was done to last. In his soundness of judgment, his wide range of 

 knowledge, his thoroughness in research, he ranks intellectually with 

 the great legal codifiers rather than the naturalists. In his works on 

 coral-islands, for example, he stated the contending theories with 

 judicial fairness and lucidity. He gave his verdict in favour of 

 Darwin's views, and added some original arguments of great import- 

 ance in their support. But he was inferior to Darwin in imagination. 

 His classifications were artificial, and his views were more often in 

 error, owing to excessive caution and lack of daring than from any 

 other failing. Thus his masterly paper on the submerged fiords at 

 the mouth of the Hudson River exercised only a very small proportion of 

 the influence it might have had if he had not thrown back the forma- 

 tion of the valley to the Trias, apparently because his imagination 

 recoiled from the conclusions that followed from attributing it to a 

 later date. 



But caution is probably an error on the right side, especially in a 

 man who worked on so many subjects and on so many lines as did 

 Dana. His shorter papers, including several contributions to 

 Natural Science, were very numerous and extraordinarily diverse 

 in their range. It is however as a great monographer that he will be 

 best remembered, and it is his great systematic reports on corals, 

 Crustacea, vulcanity, and mineralogy that will form the most enduring 

 monument of his fame. 



JOHN ADAM RYDER. 

 Born 1852. Died March 26, 1895. 



THE death of this distinguished American embryologist will come 

 as a great shock to his many English friends. Professor Ryder 

 was born near London, in Franklin Co., Pennsylvania, and received 



