178 Prof. Sedgwick^s Remarks on the President a Address at 



wrote more than ouce, both to Mr. Hamilton and to Mr. T. R. 

 Jones, that I might know whether any explanation had been 

 offered ; and at length I was informed (in a letter from Mr. Ha- 

 milton, dated December 27) " that on the 7th of January a 

 statement would be made by himself before the Geological Society 

 entirely exonerating me from all charge of wilful disobedience to 

 their laws and customs*." 



While accepting Mr. Hamilton's condition, I distinctly re- 

 served to myself the full liberty of publishing any further vin- 

 dication of myself, or of my previous memoirs, which I might 

 think right or expedient. My leading object, in what is above 

 stated, has been to prove that I have neither shown a disgraceful 

 indifference to a charge so publicly brought against me, nor have 

 made any needless delay in defending myself from what I thought 

 its injustice. 



I have the honour to be. Gentlemen, 



Your faithful Servant, 



Norwich, January 9, 1857. Adam Sedgwick. 



The passage in the Anniversary Address upon which I wish 

 to comment is word for word as follows : — " I must also cor- 

 rect Prof. Sedgwick's memory when he says that the Council 

 refused to publish his next paper in 1853. It is true he makes 

 no complaint. He admits that part of it was in a controversial 

 form. But I must remind Prof. Sedgwick that it was only the 

 conclusion, viz. the controversial portion, which the Council 

 objected to publish ; the body of the paper would have been duly 

 printed ; and when I wrote to inform him of this decision, and 

 to request his sanction to the suppression of the latter portion, 

 the reply which I received was to the effect th;)t he could give 

 no answer until he had seen the paper again, and judged of the 

 effect of the intended omission. I directed the paper to be for- 

 warded to him, and after waiting many months for a reply, the 

 only intimation I received of his intention was finding it printed 

 in another journal. Such a proceeding was in the highest degree 

 irregular. The paper was the property of the Society, and 

 Professor Sedgwick, an old President of the Society, must have 

 known that he had no right to make such use of it without 

 having first obtained the sanction of the Council to its with- 

 drawal." 



Reply to the above Extract. 



In the first sentence of this extract the author blunders in 

 the date; and I only pause to remark, that to stumble on the 



* Since this letter to the Editors was written, I have learnt that Mr. Ha- 

 milton's statement was duly made, and so far I am grateful to him for it. 



