72 SKETCH OF THE LIFE AND CHARACTER 
transition from inorganic to organic matter. The 
discovery of their true nature he considered as an 
important addition to the Fossil Flora. 
The last scientific question which exercised his 
thoughts, and which was deeply interesting him 
at the time of his death, was that respecting the 
former existence of glaciers in places where they 
are no longer found, which had been brought into 
notice by the original views and bold generaliza- 
tions of Professor Agassiz. There was indeed a 
singular coincidence between the results of some 
of his personal observations and the views pro- 
pounded by Agassiz. On his return from the 
scientific meeting at Glasgow, he took the oppor- 
tunity of visiting some natural terraces on the 
Eildon hills round Galashiels, in the neighbour- 
hood of Melrose and Abbotsford in Selkirkshire, 
to which his attention had been called by an arti- 
cle in Chambers’s Edinburgh Journal, where they 
were attributed to the action of water and consi- 
dered as ancient beaches. On examining the spot, 
he was convinced that they could not have been 
produced by such a cause, and stated the grounds 
of his opinion in an article communicated to the 
Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science. 
Before the article appeared, he saw the announce- 
e 
