Mr, Smith's Geological Claims stated. 177 



7th. Having by the same persevering attention to the surface 

 in connection with its Strata leneath it, ascertained the true 

 source of the supply of all Springs of Water, to be the superficial 

 water (of rains, or streams, pools, &c.) percolating downwards 

 through porous Strata or Alluvia, until intercepted by water- 

 tight strata, or by Faults or patches of clayey alluvia, or by Water 

 already stagnated, in such porous masses ; — and having deduced 

 and applied in an extensive practice, then commenced, these in- 

 vestigations and conclusions, as to the Strata and Springs, to the 

 Draining of Land., wherein Mr. Smith has been employed, in 

 most of the improving agricultural districts in the kingdom, since 

 about the beginning of this century. 



8th. Having while engaged in the earliest of the investigations 

 above mentioned, ascertained the important fact of ihQ fossil 

 Shells, Corals and other organic remains, imbedded in the strata, 

 not being accidentally or capriciously distributed therein, but that 

 each particular species of these organic remains (when such 

 species are with the requisite niceties discriminated) has its pro- 

 per and invariable place in some particular stratum or bed, of 

 the successive laminae of the earth;— and having then drawn the 

 conclusion, and verified it by an extended research, that some one 

 or an asseml)lage of two or more of these species of fossil Shells, 

 &c. may serve as new and more distinctive marks, of the identity 

 of most of the Strata in England *, than were previously known 

 or resorted to, by mineralogists or others. 



9th. Having ascertained, by the actual tracing and examining 

 of great lengths of most of the upper and middle Strata of Eng- 

 land, that the mineralogical characters, as well as the more ob- 

 vious or useful qualities of nearly all of them, vary so consi- 

 derallij, in different parts of their course and breadth of surface, 

 as to render any Jiames for such strata, or descriptions of them 

 founded on mere mineral characters, veiy uncertain and uselessf : 

 yet probably, no instance has occurred, of any remarkable or use- 

 ful quality of, or property attending a stratum (including its 

 nodules and organized fossib) having occurred m o?ze p/ace only; 

 but more commonly, such occur in numerous places on its range ; 

 nearly ail the properties of a stratum, more or less often and 



principle of selecting, mentioned p. 1G2 of his Report; all which he iic- 

 knovrledgcs having derived, from the instructions of Mr. Smith, in niineral 

 surveying : see also the Phil. Mag. vol. xxxv. p. 131^, and vol. xlii. p. 1()8. 



• On the 5th of August 1807, Mr. Farey published an explicit notification 

 of these discoveries and conclusions by Mr. Smith, as to fossil S/iells, in the 

 latter part of the article Co.\r,, in Dr. Rees's Cycloprcdia. 



f A matter on which Mr. Farey very pointedly insisted in 181 1, in the 

 preface to, and in various other parts of his Derbyshire Report, vol. i. 



Vol. 51. No. 231). March 18 IS. M suddenlv 



