1846 WINTER LIFE IN LONDON 77 



time to time to return to this hospitable home. 1 From 

 his voluminous correspondence with the Dolaucothi 

 household we shall glean some interesting reminis 

 cences of his life and work in later years. 



From the brief entries in his memorandum book 

 of 1846 a few quotations may be taken, giving 

 glimpses into his London doings during three months 

 in the early part of the year. 



list January. Went to Putney with Playfair. 

 Lecture on chemical affinity. Came up to hear 

 Sedgwick s paper on Wales, Cumberland, etc. Made 

 a speech about South Wales. The old man horribly 

 wrong-headed. This meeting is referred to in a letter 

 of the 3 ist January to W. T. Aveline : * Sedgwick is at 

 work attempting to show that we are all wrong, and 

 that all North Wales (!), I think, and all South Wales 

 Cardigan and Caermarthenshire is Upper Silurian. 2 

 He vows that Aberystwith is Ludlow. I flared up 

 the other night, after his paper at the Geological, 

 when he said that that was now the case, and thus we 

 must not leave him the shadow of a leg to stand on. 

 He is not content with the Cambrian, and so, gulping 

 it down, he wheels about ten times, and turns it all in 

 Upper Silurian. 



i^th. At the Museum as usual. Had a scramble 

 with Sir H. among the old book-shops after four. 

 Bought an old Beaumont and Fletcher, and a Walton 

 and Cotton. Evening at home. Wrote Eliza. 



i^th February. At home at night reading the fifth 

 edition of the Vestiges [of Creation]. Saw in it things 



1 Among his papers he preserved a clever and amusing sketch of a road map 

 of Wales by Edward Forbes, which showed Dolaucothi in the centre, with roads 

 leading directly to it from every quarter, even the most remote, where Ramsay 

 was stationed. 



2 Yet Sedgwick was partly right. See \V. Keeping, Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. 

 xxxvii. (1881), p. 141. 



