PALJEONTOLOGICAL RESEARCH 273 



paramount pre-occupations. It furnished him with 

 solace from the toils of the quarry and the building 

 yard, it supplied him with a healthful relief from 

 the labours of the bank, and when in later years he 

 escaped each autumn for a few weeks of much needed 

 leisure from the cares and responsibilities of the 

 Editor's desk, it led him to ramble at will all over 

 his native country, and brought him into acquaintance 

 with every type of its rocks and its landscapes. 



Unquestionably the most original part of his scien- 

 tific work, that wherein he added most to the sum 

 of acquired knowledge, is to be found in his recon- 

 struction of the extinct types of fishes which he 

 discovered in the Old Red Sandstone. The merit 

 of these labours can hardly be properly appreciated 

 unless it be borne in mind v that he came to the study 

 of the subject with no preliminary biological training, 

 save what he could pick up for himself from an 

 examination of such denizens of the waters of the 

 neighbouring firths as he could meet with. But after 

 prolonged search he could find in these northern seas 

 no living creatures, the structure of which afforded 

 him any clue to that of the fossil fishes of Cromarty. 

 Some men had concluded that the organisms were 

 ancient turtles, others that they were crustaceans, or 

 even aquatic beetles. He had the sagacity, however, 

 to surmise that they were probably all fishes, and 

 he enjoyed the satisfaction afterwards of learning that 

 Agassiz pronounced even the most bizarre amongst 

 them to belong to that great division of the animal 

 kingdom. He was guided by his own intuitive con- 

 ception of what must have been the plan on which 



