542 Geological Society. Anniversaty Address, 18412. 



pended his private means in advancing Its progress than Leopold 

 von Buch. The chief works by which his fame was reared are well 

 known ; but with the numberless memoirs printed and published at 

 las own charge and gratuitously distributed, I regret to say, English 

 geologists are by no means sufficiently acquainted ; and justice can- 

 not be I'endered to him until the whole of his researches are brought 

 before the public in a combined form. In the mean time we offer 

 our Medal to this distinguished man, to show that we seek to re- 

 ward him not only for his acknowledged great works, but also for 

 those efforts to advance science, which are too little known. Such, 

 for instance, is the large geological map of Germany, including the 

 Alps and adjacent regions, published without allusion to his name, 

 and commonly known as the map of Martin Schropp and Co. ; a 

 most remarkable production, whether we consider the date of its 

 publication or the expenditure of mind, labour, and money which it 

 must have cost the author. And although the result of these la- 

 bours has since been improved upon by the efforts of several of his 

 countrymen, among whom the names of Hoffmann and Von Dechen 

 stand prominently forward, it is well to know that no one has more 

 untiringly contributed new information to his younger friends than 

 Von Buch. When a traveller at Berlin, upwards of two years ago, 

 and lost in admiration at the progress which physical geography 

 and geological maps were making in that metropolis, I was much 

 surprised to learn, that M. von Buch had in his possession an un- 

 published geological map of Bohemia, all, be it observed, worked 

 out by his own patient observations on foot. Aware, from a former 

 rapid survey of that country, that our knowledge of Bohemia Avas 

 still very imperfect, I obtained from the author a coloured copy, 

 which I first exhibited to the British Association at Glasgow (1840), 

 and which I now present to the Geological Society. 



Again, after successfully developing, in the spirit of a true phi- 

 losopher, the recondite phsenomena of the metamorphism of I'ocks 

 by the naost laborious pedestrian efforts, have Ave not seen, that as 

 years rolled on and our veteran leader began to feel, that the toil of 

 gaining the mountain crest must soon pass from his own limbs to 

 those of younger men, he has so vigorously applied his mind to 

 Palaeontology as to throw new lights over this department of our 

 many-headed science ? No sooner did he grapple with this task, 

 and that too when he had passed the meridian of life, than he dis- 

 played the same originality of mind which had marked all his pre- 

 vious inquiries. Subjecting the family of Ammonites to revision, 

 and convinced that their innumerable species were not founded on 

 true natural distinctions, he took the lines of suture as a basis, and 

 thereon established a limited number of normal or typical forms, 

 each characteristic of certain strata. The Terehratula, so common 

 in all the secondaiy strata, were next passed in revicAV, and types 

 were fixed upon, to which a number of slightly varying forms Avere 

 referred, a Avork Avhich our French brethren have considered so 

 important, that they have republished it in the Transactions of the 

 Geological Society of France. Then folloAved his illustration of the 



