^JT. 27-29.] TERTIARY MEMOIRS. 55 



sandstone. The pitchstone is compact, and contains a few grains 

 of glassy felspar. A few of the red sandstones in contact with 

 it are highly indurated. 



This Glasgow meeting was a signal success, and its 

 president, Mr (afterwards Sir) Eoderick Murchison, 

 wrote of "the glorious day at Arran, when I lectured 

 to a good band of workmen with every peak of Goatfell 

 illlumined." Prestwich contributed no paper, nor do 

 we find his name specially mentioned. From what we 

 can glean, he had only been able to snatch one day, or 

 perhaps two, so as to attend the Arran excursion. He 

 was the reverse of self-assertive, and his habitual diffi- 

 dence often kept him in the background, where, never- 

 theless, the busy brain-work went on, and where he 

 pondered and observed. Memoirs were soon to eman- 

 ate from his pen which were to give him a European 

 reputation. 



Onward during several years he was occupied in 

 following up those researches in England and France, 

 which he embodied in the well-known series of Tertiary 

 papers. Of these Sir John Evans remarks : 1 " He not 

 only reduced the little-known English Tertiaries into 

 proper system (establishing the separate existence of 

 certain local beds to which he gave the name of the 

 Thanet Sands, proving the synchronism of the Reading 

 beds with those of Woolwich, and fixing the true posi- 

 tion of the London Clay with respect to the Hampshire 

 basin), but he succeeded in correlating the Tertiary beds 

 of England, France, and Belgium in such a manner 

 that his classification was accepted by most geologists, 

 and has stood the test of time." 



In 1840 and 1841 Prestwich resided at 10 Devon- 



1 Obituary Notice to the Eoyal Society, vol. lx., 1896, p. xiii. 



