327 



able benefit to the other. Mr. Smith found what was of so much consequence 

 to him, a cabinet stored with specimens carefully and judiciously selected, 

 every one of which was referred to the locality from which it was taken, and 

 Mr. Richardson met in Mr. Smith a man capable of appljdng to its best use 

 the produce of his care and labour."* 



Professor Phillips, in his memoir of Wm. Smith, several times 

 alludes to Mr. Richardson. As the book is out of print I give the 

 extract in full which refers to this meeting : — 



It was fortunate for Mr. Smith and for the progress of his views, that he 

 gained at this time the friendship of a man singularly competent to estimate 

 the truth and value of these views, and both able and willing to advocate the 

 merit of their author. The Rev. Benjamin Richardson was at this time 

 living in Bath, and possessed a choice collection of local fossils, mostly 

 gathered by his own diligent hands. Extensively versed in natural history, 

 and generally well acquainted with the progress of science, he was perfectly 

 enthusiastic in following out, and liberal in enabling others to prosecute 

 new and ingenious researches, especially if they tended to practical and 

 public good. He knew accurately the country in which Mr. Smith had 

 principally worked, and was acquainted with the views entertained on the 

 subject of fossils, which had been recorded in books, or were adopted 

 by the collectors, who were even then celebrated in the vicinity of Bath. He 

 had no knowledge of the laws of stratification, and the connexion between 

 the forms of organic life, and the order of superposition of the strata ; while, 

 on the other hand, his new friend had very little knowledge of the true nature 

 of these organic forms, and their exact relation to analogous living types. 

 The result of a meeting between two such reciprocally adjusted minds was an 

 electric combination ; the fossils which the one possessed were marshalled in 

 the order of strata by the other, until all found their appropriate places, and 

 the arrangement of the cabinet became a true copy of nature. 



That such fossils had been found in such rocks was immediately acknow- 

 ledged by Mr. Richardson to be true, though the connexion had not before 

 presented itself to his mind ; but when Mr. Smith added the assurance, that 

 everywhere throughout his district, and to considerable distances around, it 

 was a general law that the " same strata were found always in the same order 

 of superposition, and contained the same peculiar fossils," his friend was both 

 astonished and incredulous. He immediately acceded to Mr. Smith's pro- 

 posal for undertaking some field examinations to determine the truth of these 

 assertions, and having interested in this object a new and learned associate, 

 the Rev. Joseph Townsend (author of Travels in Spain), they at once executed 

 the project. 



" H. J." further adds that Mr. Richardson looked upon Mr. 

 Smith as a man capable of advancing the knowledge he so anxiously 



* Bath and Bristol Mag. 



