8 REPORT— 1892. 



as that between the Plutonists and Neptunists would be sure to famish 

 abundant matter for the gratification of this propensity. Turning over 

 the pages of Kay's 'Portraits,' where so much that was distinctive of 

 Edinburgh society a hundred years ago is embalmed, we find Hutton's 

 personal peculiarities and pursuits touched ofi" in good-humoured carica- 

 ture. In one plate he stands with arms folded and hammer in hand, 

 meditating on the face of a cliff, from which rocky prominences in shape 

 of human faces, perhaps grotesque likenesses of his scientific opponents, 

 grin at him. In another engraving he sits in conclave with his friend 

 Black, possibly arranging for that famous banquet of garden-snails which 

 the two worthies had persuaded themselves to look upon as a strangely 

 neglected form of human food. More than a generation later, when the 

 Huttonists and Wernerists were at the height of their antagonism, the 

 humorous side of the controversy did not escape the notice of the author 

 of ' Waverley,' who, you will remember, when he makes Meg Dods 

 recount the various kinds of wise folk brought by Lady Penelope Pen- 

 feather from Edinburgh to St. Konan's Well, does not forget to include 

 those who ' rin uphill and down dale, knapping the chucky-stanes to 

 pieces wi' hammers, like sae mony road-makers run daft, to see how the 

 warld was made.' 



Among the names of the friends and followers of Hutton there is one 

 which on this occasion deserves to be held in especial honour, that of Sir 

 James Hall, of Dunglass. Having accompanied Hutton in some of his 

 excursions, and having discussed with him the problems presented by the 

 rocks of Scotland, Hall was familiar with the views of his master, and 

 was able to supply him with fresh illustrations of them from different 

 parts of the country. Gifted with remarkable originality and ingenuity, 

 he soon perceived that some of the questions involved in the theory of 

 the earth could probably be solved by direct physical experiment. Hutton, 

 however, mistrusted any attempt ' to judge of the great operations of 

 Nature by merely kindling a fire and looking into the bottom of a little 

 crucible.' Out of deference to this prejudice Hall delayed to carry out 

 his intention during Hutton's lifetime. But afterwards he instituted a 

 remarkable series of researches which are memorable in the history of 

 science as the first methodical endeavour to test the value of geological 

 speculation by an appeal to actual experiment. The Neptunists, in 

 ridiculing the Huttonian doctrine that basalt and similar rocks had once 

 been molten, asserted that, had such been their origin, these masses would 

 now be found in the condition of glass or slag. Hall, however, triumph- 

 antly vindicated his friend's view by proving that basalt could be fused. 



