148 Dr.- Fitton's Notes on ike History ofEyiglish Geology. 



1821, for insertion in a Journal more immediately devoted 

 to science than that in which it originally appeared ; but its 

 publication was at that time prevented by accidental circum- 

 stances. As the Review has been more recently mentioned 

 by the late President of the Geological Society, in announcing 

 the award of the first WoUaston Medal to Mr. Smith*, I now 

 beg leave to place at your disposal one of the printed copies 

 above mentioned. 



I remain. Gentlemen, &c. &c. 

 London, July 1832. Wm. H. FitTON. 



A Map may not, at first sight, appear to come within the 

 iscope of a literary publication; but the performance now be- 

 fore us, with the other works connected with it, has more than 

 ordinary claims upon the attention of the public. It con- 

 tains a great deal of information, of practical importance as 

 •well as speculative interest. It is the first work of the kind 

 that has ever appeared in England ; and it is the production, 

 after the labour of more than twenty years, of a most inge- 

 nious man, who has been singularly deficient in the art of in- 

 troducing himself to public notice. 



Mr. Smith is by profession a civil engineer, and, we are in- 

 formed, is particularly skilled in that department of his business 

 which relates to draining, and the structure of canals. It ap- 

 pears, that in the course of the inquiries to which his occupa- 

 tions naturally led him, he had occasion, many years ago, to 

 observe the regularity and steadiness of the order exhibited by 

 the strata in the vicinity of Bath; and about the year 1793, he 

 drew up a tabular view of the stratification of that district, 

 which in fact contained the rudiments of all his subsequent dis- 

 coveries, and was in itself a proof of great sagacity and appli- 

 cation. In the course of different journeys afterwards made, he 

 not only recognised, among the strata in the North of England, 

 several of his old acquaintances at Bath, but was surprised to 



ing to the Variations of the Substrata, illustrated by the most Descriptive 

 Names. — 15 sheets, coloured. Carey, London. August, 1815. 

 i,.., ^' 3. A Memoir of the Map and Delineation, &c. pp. 51. 1816. 



" 3. Geological Section from London to Snowdon. 1817." 



" 4. A Series of County Maps, pn a much larger scale than that of the 

 General ' Delineation,' &c., coloured to correspond with it. 1817- 



" 5. Strata identified by Organized Fossils, containing Prints on co- 

 loured paper of the most characteristic Specimens in each Stratum. 4to. 

 Pnblishpd in Numbers. 1816. 



" 6. Stradgraphital System of Organized Fossils, with reference to the 

 Specimens of the original Geological Collection in the liritisli Museum, 

 4to. 1817-'' 



• See Phil. Mag. und.\nnals, N.S, vol. ix. p. ii7-'.— Lou. 



