202 EMINENT NATURALISTS. 



conjunction with the Government, the Murchison 

 Professorship of Greology in the University of Edin- 

 burgh, and in the winter of that year was struck down 

 by paralysis. He rallied, however, sufficiently to 

 prepare his last Address in 1871, but as the autumn 

 came round he gradually became worse, until he could 

 no longer speak, and on the 22nd of October he quietly 

 and almost imperceptibly passed away, at the ripe age 

 of seventy-nine. 



The honours which Sir Roderick Murchison won are 

 a great testimony to the scientific enlightenment of the 

 age. We have crowned Science Queen, and all her 

 servants form her court and wear the title she bestows. 

 And truly, a scientific man earns his honours more 

 nobly, and wears them more honourably, than those who 

 win them in political controversy or on the field of 

 battle. In future years he will be known as one of the 

 pioneers of that new order of renown which is won by 

 fruitful service rather than by destructive deeds. The 

 scientific theories which he was unable to admit gained 

 a rapid victory over those to which he clung ; he was 

 therefore rather the great authority of a transition time 

 than the prophet of the future ; but the very fact that, 

 after a long life spent in the service of science, he went 

 to his grave as fidl of honours as of years, is one more 

 illustrious proof that science has, in latter days, opened 

 for every one who chooses to study it, a new way to 

 fame and historical renown. 



Pardon & Sons, Printers, Who- Office Covrt, Fleet Street, London, K.C. 



