146 HISTORY OF GEOLOGY AND PALEONTOLOGY. 



mineralogical professors, but, soon, specialisation was felt to 

 be necessary, and professorships began to be founded for 

 geology and palaeontology as a distinct scientific study. 



The encouragement given by the strict academical system 

 of preparation and research, and the higher standard in the 

 demand for accurate detail, had the effect of diminishing the 

 influence of private individuals. Leopold von Buch, Charles 

 Lyell, De la Beche, and Murchison are among the few leaders 

 of modern geology who worked independently. 



With specialisation in geology and palaeontology, the spring- 

 time of the science was over. The period was past when a 

 man could mentally survey the whole field of petrographical 

 knowledge, when great discoveries lay, so to speak, by the 

 roadside, and only required to be observed. Instead of hasty, 

 widely extended observations and broad generalisations, there 

 began now the less brilliant, but more lasting, investigation of 

 details. The telescope of a geological traveller surveying the 

 rocks from afar was exchanged more and more for the 

 microscope of a specially trained academician. The rapid 

 advances made by modern geology are due to concentrated 

 endeavour in the solution of problems of a definite and 

 limited character, and the universities and academies have 

 sedulously fostered the accomplishment of such work. 



Among German universities, Berlin has always held a 

 distinguished place. Gustav Rose, Ehrenberg, and Beyrich 1 

 were some of the famous teachers in Berlin University. For 

 nearly sixty years Beyrich exerted a strong influence on the 

 younger generations. Although without any great oratorical 

 gifts, Beyrich fascinated his hearers by the carefully considered 

 subject-matter of his lectures and the breadth of his know- 

 ledge, while in his practical teaching in the field he provided a 

 model of accuracy and completeness. Not a few of the greatest 



1 Heinrich Ernst Beyrich, born 1815 in Berlin, entered the Berlin 

 University at the age of sixteen, and presented his thesis in 1837. Soon 

 afterwards he was appointed an assistant in the mineralogical museum, and 

 in 1857 was made director of the palaeontological collection. As a teacher 

 he was first a privat docent (a university tutor), then an extra-Ordinary 

 professor, and in 1865 became full Professor of Geology and Palaeontology 

 in the University and in the Mining Academy. In 1848 the German 

 Geological Society was founded, and Beyrich was one of its promoters. 

 In 1873, when the Prussian Geological Survey was instituted, Beyrich was 

 appointed co-director with Hauchecorne. He died in Berlin on Qth July 

 1896. 



