Smith's Provincial Terminology 235 



various subdivisions of the Secondary rocks, from the base 

 of the New Eed Sandstone up to the Chalk, and for the 

 demonstration that these successive platforms are marked 

 off from each other, not merely by mineral characters, but 

 by their peculiar assemblages of organic remains. From 

 his provincial terminology come the more sonorous names 

 of Purbeckian, Portlandian, Callovian, Corallian, Bath- 

 onian, Liassic, which are now familiar words in every 

 geological text-book. 1 



In his eagerness to make his map as complete and 

 accurate as was possible to him, Smith spent so freely of 

 his hardly-earned income that he accumulated no savings 

 against the day of trial, which came only too soon. He 

 had been induced to lay down a railway on a little pro- 

 perty which early in life he had purchased near Bath, 

 with the view of opening some new quarries and bringing 

 the building-stone to the barges on the canal. Unfortun- 



1 Before passing from the subject of Smith's map I may refer to the 

 map of England and Wales which was prepared by G. B. Greenough and 

 published in 1819. Greenough, in the memoir accompanying this map, 

 states that though he knew as early as 1804 that Smith had begun a 

 similar work, he had been led to believe that the design was abandoned. 

 Accordingly he undertook the task in 1808, and having been encouraged by 

 the Geological Society, of which he was President, to complete it on a 

 large scale, he proceeded with it, and the map as prepared by him had 

 been more than a year in the hands of the engraver when Smith's map 

 appeared in 1815. Greenough's is a better piece of engraving, and in 

 some respects is more detailed, especially as regards the formations 

 older than the Coal. It shows how much information as to English 

 stratigraphy had become available, partly no doubt through Smith's 

 labours before 1815. Greenough's map was taken over by the Geo- 

 logical Society, has been as far as possible kept up to date, and is still 

 on sale. But the map in its present form differs much from its author's 

 original version. The appearance of this map under the sanction of the 

 Geological Society seems to have affected the sale of Smith's, which does 

 not appear to have reached a second edition. A much reduced version of 

 it was published in 1820. 



