REVIEWS. 



William Smith : His Maps and Memoirs. By Thomas Sheppard, 

 M.Sc, F.G.S., Curator of the Hull Museum, pp. 75-253 (the 

 original pagination is retained), with 48 plates and other 

 illustrations. Hull : A. Brown & Sons. 1920. 



TN these days of specialization the study of the history of the 

 -■- rise and progress of our science receives less attention than in 

 earlier times. In the writer's youth, for instance, a historical 

 question on each of the subjects for the Natural Sciences Tripos at 

 Cambridge was compulsory, but this has long ceased to be the case. 

 This is a pity, for apart from sentimental considerations, the student 

 will reap much advantage from a study of the difficulties with which 

 his predecessors were confronted, and of the mistakes which they 

 made. One of the troubles of a geologist who has to work in a country 

 of which the geology is unknown is due to the fact that his field- 

 work at home is learnt in an area which has been mapped in detail. 

 By studying the life and work of Smith, he will discover how the 

 work was done in England at a time when its geology was practically 

 unknown. 



The importance of William Smith's work is now universally 

 recognized, but it was not always so. In Dr. Brewster's Edinburgh 

 Journal of Science for April, 1831, unjust censure was passed upon 

 the Geological Society of London for awarding the first Wollaston 

 Medal to Smith. The action of the Society, however, was fully 

 justified by a writer " F." in the first number of the Monthly 

 American Journal of Geology, published in July, 1831, who passes 

 high encomium upon Smith's work. 



But although the importance of the work is so generally recognized, 

 we have up to now not been in possession of a very full and detailed 

 account of it. Professor J. Phillips's Memoirs of William Smith, 

 LL.D., appeared in 1844, but the book is now very scarce. In 1897 

 the late Professor Judd contributed an important paper to the 

 Geological Magazine on " William Smith's Manuscript Maps ". 

 Much scattered information about Smith is incorporated in 

 Mr. Sheppard's work, and noted in the bibliography at the end of 

 the book. But a detailed account of the labours of the " Father 

 of English Geology " did not exist. Now, thanks to Mr. Sheppard, 

 and to the wise policy of the Yorkshire Geological Society, from 

 whose Proceedings the memoir is reprinted, we have it. 



It is indeed fortunate that Mr. Sheppard undertook the task of 

 writing the work. A skilled geologist, he is also fully versed in the 

 scientific methods of the historian and bibliographer, and has 

 evidently left no stone unturned in his efforts to trace Smith's 

 various publications and manuscript writings, with the result that 

 we have a worthy and almost exhaustive record of Smith's con- 

 tributions to science. 



