Alfred Richard Cecil Selwyn. 325 



to science, he might have achieved something considerable. He was 

 an amateur in nothing in the sense, that is, of giving half his thoughts 

 to it. Whatever he worked at absorbed him entirely for the time, 

 and that was doubtless the reason why during the last eighteen years 

 of his life public affairs left no room for scientific activity." 



H. McL. 



ALFEED EICHAED CECIL SELWYN. 18241902. 



The subject of this notice had a unique experience of official scientific 

 life, having served, with a practically continuous career of about half-a- 

 century, on three Geological Surveys, and having been at the head of 

 two of them. Beginning at home, his survey-life was shifted eastward 

 and westward to distant colonies, as shown below : 



Geological Survey of England and Wales, 1845 to 1852, about 



7 years. 

 Geological Survey of Victoria (Director), 1852 to 1869, about 



17 years. 



Geological Survey of Canada (Director), 1869 to 1894, about 

 25 years. 



He was the son of the Rev. Canon Townsend Selwyn, and his wife, 

 Charlotte Sophia, daughter of Lord George Murray, Bishop of St. 

 David's. He was born July 28, 1824, at Kilmington, Somersetshire. 

 He married, in 1852, Matilda Charlotte, daughter of the Eev. Edward 

 Selwyn. On all sides, therefore, he was connected with the church, 

 of which another member of his family, Bishop Selwyn, was a con- 

 spicuous officer. Nevertheless, he did not have a University education ; 

 but was at first brought up at home and afterwards in Switzerland, in 

 which country he got his first taste for geology. 



Selwyn joined the English Geological Survey at the age of 21, under 

 Sir H. De la Beche, and had the good fortune to have Eamsay as his 

 teacher in geologic mapping in North Wales. His ability for this- 

 work was soon shown, and for some years he took a prominent part in 

 the difficult task of mapping the Palaeozoic rocks of that district and 

 its borderland, a task in which his powers as a climber greatly aided 

 him: indeed for this reason much of the toughest work, from an 

 athletic point of view, fell to his share. 



Amongst other things, he mapped the complicated volcanic district 

 of Cader Idris, and was the first to discover an unconformity between 



