650 



SMITH, THOMAS SOUTHWOOD, M.D. 



SMITH, WILLIAM, LL.D. 



660 



Brussels on an embassy to the Emperor Charles V. There is some 

 reason to suppose that on the fall of his patron Somerset he lost his 

 place of secretary ; but if so, he waa soon restored to it ; for in April, 

 1551, he was sent in that capacity on the embassy to Henry II. of 

 France, to treat of a marriage between King Edward and that king's 

 daughter. 



When the crown passed to Mary, Sir Thomas Smith was deprived of 

 all his employments and preferments ; but having conducted himself 

 with prudence, he was not farther molested, and was even allowed a 

 pension of 100?. a year. On the accession of Elizabeth, he waa 

 immediately restored to his deacery, and he was soon also recalled to 

 public employment. In 1559 he was one of the commissioners sent 

 to France by whom a peace was concluded between the two countries ; 

 and being again sent thither in 1562, he continued to reside abroad till 

 1566. He was also employed on another mission to France in 1567. 

 Then he resided for some years at his seat in the country, till he was 

 recalled to court in 1571 ; and being admitted of the privy council, 

 was soon after appointed assistant secretary of state under Burleigh. 

 In 1572 he once more went over in a diplomatic capacity to France; 

 and while he was abroad he was nominated by the queen Chancellor of 

 the Order of the Garter. In June that same year, on Burleigh's promo- 

 tion to the place of lord treasurer, Smith succeeded him as secretary of 

 state; and this office he held till his death, August 12th, 1577. He died 

 possessed of considerable landed property, which, as he left no issue, 

 though he was twice .married, descended to the family of one of his 

 younger brothers. A natural son whom he had was killed in Ireland 

 in 1573. 



Besides his Latin treatise on the pronunciation of Greek, already 

 mentioned, Sir Thomas Smith is the author of another tract, entitled 

 'De Recta et Emendata Lingua) Anglicse Scriptione,' printed along 

 with that in 1568. But his most remarkable work is that entitled 

 ' The English Commonwealth,' in three books, first published in 1584, 

 and several times reprinted since ; and in a Latin translation executed 

 by himself, forming one of the small volumes of the collection of the 

 ' Respublicse.' Some shorter performances of his are given in the 

 appendix to his Life by Strype, which also contains accounts of his 

 unpiinted writings. [STRYPE, JOHN.] 



* SMITH, THOMAS SOUTHWOOD, M.D. a distinguished writer 

 and physician. He was born about the year 1790, and took his degree 

 of Doctor of Medicine in the University of Edinburgh in the year 1816. 

 He first settled in the country, where he married, and came to 

 London in 1820. He did not however come as a stranger, for in 1814 

 he had written a book entitled ' The Divine Government,' which had 

 excited very general attention. In this work he exhibited great power 

 of thought and capabilities which, perhaps, would have produced more 

 effect in the pulpit than in the medical profession. On settling in 

 London as a physician, he became a member and licentiate of the 

 College of Physicians. He was appointed also physician to the 

 London Fever Hospital. This gave him an opportunity of writing a 

 ' Treatise on Fever,' which deservedly increased his reputation as a 

 physician. He was one of the originators of, and writers in the ' West- 

 minister Review.' Here he forcibly pointed out the evils of the 

 "resurrection" system as then practised in London, for the purpose 

 of supplying the schools of anatomy with the means of dissection. 

 The articles thus written were republished in the form of a book, with 

 the title ' The Use of the Dead to the Living.' This work elicited 

 general attention, and concomitantly with the atrocities of Burke 

 in Edinburgh and Bishop in London, led to the passing of the present 

 Anatomy Act, by which the medical schools are enabled to study 

 anatomy, without violating in any manner the feelings of society. 

 Dr. Smith supplied the principal part of the articles on anatomy, 

 medicine, and physiology in the ' Penny Cyclopaedia.' He also 

 wrote a work on ' Animal Physiology ' in the series published by 

 the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge ; and the ' Philo- 

 sophy of Health,' a work of extensive knowledge and practical views, 

 which has since been published in the series of Knight's Shilling 

 volumes. Dr. Smith was for many years the intimate friend of 

 Jeremy Bentham, and his medical attendant at the time of his 

 death. It was the wish of this distinguished man that his body 

 should be dissected, and it was left to his friend Dr. Smith for that 

 purpose, who delivered an oration on the occasion at the school of 

 anatomy, Webb-street, Maze Pond, on June 9th, 1832. Dr. Smith 

 was appointed one of the commissioners to inquire into the condition 

 of the factory children, and was thus greatly instrumental in obtaining 

 the passing of the Factory Act. From this time his career became 

 essentially connected with the sanitary legislation of the country. 

 More devoted and self-denying efforts for the removal of terrible 

 evils have seldom been made. To this his reports bear testimony in 

 every direction. Although he has sacrificed his practice and his 

 health in this cause, the only reward he has received is an annuity of 

 300J. a year. The passing of the Public Health Act, and the various 

 measures which have b^eu taken by the government for preventing 

 the spread of disease and the increase of mortality since that time, were 

 materially advanced by the labours and zeal of Dr. Southwood Smith. 

 His numerous reports on sanitary measures and public health have 

 been published by the government in the years from 1838 to 1846, 

 and also in 1849 and 1850. 



SMITH, WILLIAM, LL.D., author of the first geological map of 



England and Wales, was born on the 23rd of March 1769, at Churchill, 

 in Oxfordshire, and died on the 28th of August 1839, at Northampton, 

 where a tablet is intended to be erected by subscription to his 

 memory. 



The life of this distinguished ornament of English geology is full 

 of events which illustrate the power of a vigorous intellect and patient 

 disposition, in conquering the difficulties which sometimes impede the 

 prosecution of science ; but we propose in this brief notice merely to 

 state a few of the circumstances which justify his admitted claim to 

 be entitled ' father of English geology.' 



Previous to the year 1791, Mr. Smith had made observations on 

 the various sorts of land, as depending on different kinds of rocks ; 

 had compared, for example, the red marls and lias of Warwickshire; 

 with the oolitic soils and strata of Gloucestershire ; but in 1791, beiiiLj 

 employed to make careful surveys of collieries and mines hi Somerset- 

 shire, he found, on descending the pits and comparing the under- 

 ground sections with the surface features, evidence of a " constancy in 

 the order of superposition " of strata, much more extensive and 

 practically and analytically demonstrated than was ever stated or 

 admitted before. Reflecting on this circumstance, he resolved to 

 examine if the strata thus regularly superposed, were equally or 

 approximately co-extensive in the limited district of Somersetshire 

 and the bordering counties, in which his labours were then confined. 

 He found by abundant investigation and levellings in separate valleys, 

 that generally the edges of the strata above the coal were continuous 

 on the surface, their plane surfaces declining into the earth in one 

 direction, namely, toward the east or south-east; but that the strata 

 of coal lying beneath the red marl were not ' conformed ' in their 

 inclination to the rocks above. This 'unconformity' he represented by 

 a large working section of Pucklechurch Colliery in Gloucestershire. 



In his investigations, which, as engineer to the Somerset Coal 

 Canal, he made for the purpose of setting out the line and letting the 

 works, it became difficult always to recognise and discrimiuate the 

 rocks which were to be cut through, on account of the great mineral 

 resemblance between some of these and their accidentally displaced 

 positions. Searching for marks to aid these distinctions, Mr. Smith 

 was quickly led to perceive the constancy with which certain classes 

 of organic remains accompanied only particular layers or strata. By 

 collecting these fossils, and placing them in relative order, as they 

 were found lying in the earth, he was soon able by their aid to 

 'identify' the strata near Bath; to declare, regarding all these 

 stratified rocks, that they had each formed " successively the bed of 

 the sea," and contained each the remains of the creatures which then 

 lived and died. These remains were different in different strata, 

 because at successive times the forms of life had changed, and because 

 of the influence on life of the different mineral constitution of the 

 sea's bed ; but they were generally identical in distant parts of the 

 same strata. 



With theee ideas clearly established, Mr. Smith, in 1794, was 

 enabled, by one long journey through a great part of England and 

 Wales, to generalise the propositions, and to commence, as an obvious 

 consequence of such views, a 'Map of the Strata of England and 

 Wales.' Five years afterwards he drew up a tabular view of the, 

 ' Order of the Strata and their imbedded Organic Remains, in the 

 vicinity of Bath, examined and proved prior to 1799.' A geological 

 map of England on a small scale was produced in 1801 ; and the 

 author promised in that year a valuable volume to accompany docu- 

 ments so new and important. The originals of these documents are 

 fortunately preserved. It would be painful to speak of the dis- 

 couragements and difficulties which Mr. Smith had to overcome 

 before, in 1815, on a largo and handsome scale, appeared the 'Geo- 

 logical Map of England and Wales, with part of Scotland,' with an 

 interesting memoir. These difficulties were often generated by his 

 own unmeasured zeal iu prosecuting his favourite science. To it all 

 the considerable profits of a successful profession were freely devoted; 

 and not even in later years, when he had to suffer the consequences of 

 such devotion, was he ever known to regret this inconvenient profusion. 



From 1819 to 1824 he gave to the world twenty-one geologically 

 coloured maps of English counties (including the remarkable four- 

 sheet map of Yorkshire), in which he was assisted by his nephew and 

 pupil, Mr. John Phillips, now professor of geology in the University of 

 Oxford. [PHILLIPS, JOHN.] He also published some valuable sections, 

 and two unfinished volumes on Organic Remains. In 1824 Mr. Smith, 

 for the first time, lectured on geology, in a course delivered at York 

 before the then newly formed Yorkshire Philosophical Society ; and 

 he subsequently delivered lectures at Scarborough, and before the 

 Philosophical Societies of Hull and Sheffield. 



In 1828 he entered into an engagement in which were passed six of 

 the calmest and happiest years of his declining life. Sir John V. B. 

 Johnstone, Bart., of Hackuess in Yorkshire, on succeeding to his 

 estates, was desirous of converting to practical effect on his farms, 

 some of the geological and botanical truths which he knew to have 

 been established in the museum and laboratory. He found in Mr. 

 Smith the union of practical and theoretical knowledge which was 

 necessary for his object, and also a desire to exemplify that knowledge 

 in agricultural improvements, which exactly coincided with his own 

 wishes. From 1828 to 1834, accordingly, Mr. Smith acted as his land- 

 steward, resided at Haokness, and occupied himself in the usual 



