290 Prof. Sedgwick^s Reply to some Statements 



that (except where mistakes might arise) I do not put an author's 

 name to any group larger or less definite than a genus, and 

 never mean to do so. 



Having now refuted these aspersions at your request, which I 

 should scarcely have done for myself, I may add, that MM. Ed- 

 wards and Haime have figured and described, as new, in their 

 * Monographic,' several corals previously published by myself in 

 the ' Annals of Natural History,' and that the first idle time I 

 have, I shall write a paper on this and other scientific unfair- 

 nesses in their works, with which at present we have nothing 

 to do. 



I have the. honour to remain. 

 My dear Sir, 



Very truly yours, 

 Rev, Prof. Sedgwich, Frederick M'Coy. 



So far as Professor M'Coy's letter bears upon matters of fact, 

 I can give my unqualified testimony in its confirmation. There 

 is not a more single-minded, honourable, and truth-loving man 

 in the list of those whom I rejoice to call my friends. No other 

 English writer has more fully and fairly quoted the works of 

 those who have preceded him in his own line of study ; and no 

 other English writer has shown the same accurate and extensive 

 knowledge of what may be called the literature of palseontology : 

 — I am not so rash as to ofi'er any estimate of the comparative 

 merits of his classification of Fossil Corals and of that given by 

 MM. Edwards and Haime. In one respect, however, he has an 

 apparent advantage over them, inasmuch as his labours are more 

 directly connected with the works of the best authors who have 

 preceded him in investigations similar to his own. 



In clearness of description the work on the Cambridge Palseo- 

 ioic Corals is almost unrivalled ; and the lithogi*aphic illustra- 

 tions, if inferior to those executed at Paris in artistical touch, 

 are by no means inferior to them in accuracy of details, and in 

 the graphic delineation of those characters which give a true 

 scientific meaning to the specimens. 



The work, when finished, will contain a careful description of 

 every English palaeozoic species in the Cambridge Museum, 

 collected during the last thirty-two years by myself and by my 

 friends from all the old fossiliferous strata of England. To 

 affirm that, in a work of such great extent and difficulty, the 

 author has fallen into no mistake or error of judgement, would 

 be an idle boast. But I do very confidently affirm, that Professor 

 M'Coy began his task at Cambridge after a thorough scientific 

 training of many previous years ; — that with acute senses sharp- 

 ened by long experience — that with a philosophical perception 



