424 Meports and Proceedings — Geologists' Association. 



eigliteen he obtained employment as a land surveyor in Oxfordshire, 

 Gloucestershire, and other parts, and had already begun carefully 

 and systematically to collect fossils and to observe the structure of 

 the rocks. In 1793 he was appointed to survey the course of the 

 intended Somersetshire Coal-Canal, near Bath. For six years ho 

 was the resident engineer of the canal, and, applying his previously- 

 acquired knowledge, he was enabled to prove that the strata from 

 the New Eed Marl (Trias) upwards followed each other in a regular 

 and orderly succession, each bed being marked by its own character- 

 istic fossils, and having a general tendency or ' dip' to the south-east. 



To verify his theory he travelled in subsequent years over the 

 greater part of England and Wales, and made careful observations 

 of the geological succession of the rocks, proving also, by the fossils 

 obtained, the identity of the strata over very wide areas along their 

 outcrops. 



His knowledge of fossils advanced even further, for he discovered 

 that those in situ retained their sharpness, whereas the same 

 specimens derived from the drifts or gravel-deposits were usually 

 rounded and water-worn, and had reached their present site by 

 subsequent erosion of the parent-rock. 



In 1799 William Smith circulated in MS. the order of succession of 

 the strata and imbedded organic remains found in the vicinity of Bath. 



His large Geological Map of England and Wales is dated 1815. 



On June 1, 1816, he published his " Strata identified by Organized 

 Fossils," with illustrations of the most characteristic specimens ia 

 each stratum (4to.). 



In 1817 he printed "A Sti'atigraphical System of Organized- 

 Fossils," compiled from the original geological collection deposited 

 in the British Museum (4to.). 



In 1819, he published a reduction of his great Geological Map, 

 together with several sections across England. 



These have just been presented to the Museum by Wm. Toplev, 

 Esq., F.G.S. 



Mr. Smith received the award of the first Wollaston Medal and 

 fund in 1831, from the hands of Prof. Sedgwick, the President of 

 the Geological Society. — " As a great original discoverer in English 

 geology, and especially for his having been the first, in this country, 

 to discover and teach the identification of strata, and to determine 

 their succession by means of their imbedded fossils." 



In June, 1832, the Government of H.M. King William the 

 Fourth awarded Mr. Smith a pension of £100 a year, but he only 

 enjoyed it for seven years, as he died 28 Aug. 1839. 



In 1835 the degree of LL.D. was conferred upon Mr. Smith by 

 the Provost and Fellows of Trinity College, Dublin. 



Perhaps the highest compliment paid him was that by Sedgwick, 

 who rightly named him "the Father of English Geology." 



The bust above the case which contains William Smith's collection 

 is a copy of that by Chantry surmounting the tablet to his memory 

 in the beautiful antique church of All Saints at Northampton, where 

 his remains lie buried. 



