312 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY REORGANISED CHAP, ix 



The death of their Director-General necessarily gave 

 rise to considerable anxiety among the officers of the 

 Survey. They hoped that their friend and colleague, 

 who had been passed over at the time of De la Beche s 

 death, would not be passed over again. Rumour, of 

 course, was busy with reports of various kinds the 

 Jermyn Street establishment was to be broken up, 

 there was to be no new Director-General, or an 

 outsider who was variously named was to be once 

 more put over the service. But, happily, these 

 predictions proved to be false. After four months of 

 suspense, Ramsay received from Lord Ripon, who 

 was then Lord-President of the Council, a letter dated 

 26th February 1872, asking him if it would be agreeable 

 to him that he should be nominated to the vacant post. 

 It was explained that the delay had arisen because 

 various questions connected with the several branches 

 of the establishment in Jermyn Street had been under 

 consideration. The appointment thus offered to him 

 did not embrace the School of Mines. A great 

 scheme was in contemplation for the formation of a 

 College of Science at South Kensington, for which 

 the Jermyn Street School would form an excellent 

 nucleus ; and it was therefore considered expedient to 

 sever the tie which from the beginning had united the 

 School of Mines to the rest of the organisation 

 planned and carried out by De la Beche. A fortnight 

 later I had the following note from Ramsay : i6t/i 

 March. I was yesterday summoned to attend a meet 

 ing of the [Committee of] Privy Council at South 

 Kensington. The result is I am Director - General 

 of the Surveys, Museum, and Mining Record Office, 

 Bristow succeeds me as Director for England and 

 Wales, Howell succeeds Bristow (as District Surveyor), 



