Rev. Professor T. G. Bonne f/, D.Sc, F.R.S. 387 



was well settled down at Cambridge, joined in the movement which 

 was being made to press its claims ; an open exhibition in Natural 

 Science was offered by St. John's, partly as a consequence of his 

 efforts. Professor Bouney, in what perhaps may be regarded as an 

 excess of grateful recognition, has been known to say that he owes 

 whatever success he has had in life to the Fellowship he obtained 

 at St. John's ; with equal, if not more truth, many who are now 

 engaged in the advancement of scientific learning might say the 

 same of the opportunities which this college exhibition has 

 afforded them. 



In the summer of 1858 Bonney paid his second visit to 

 Switzerland, crossing the Strahleck and the Weissthor; his love 

 of the Alps dates from this journey ; since then he has returned 

 to them something like two out of every three years of his life. 

 In 1860, 1862, 1863, and 1864 he was chiefly engaged in exploring 

 the French and Italian Alps, then rather imperfectly known. At 

 the end of the last journey he went on to the South of France, and 

 while there fell a victim to malaria, from the effects of which he 

 has never since been entirely free. These, though they prevented 

 him from * roughing ' it as much as he would have liked, did not put 

 a stop to his climbing, which he continued in a steady but not too 

 adventurous way till about ten years ago, and even still he sometimes 

 undertakes an ordinary ascent of 5,000 feet or so. Hence his intimate 

 knowledge of the Alps, which from the Visp to the Salzkammergut 

 is well-nigh unrivalled. 



By the year 1868 Bonney's knowledge of geology had ceased 

 to be that of an amateur ; the stage of preparation had passed, and 

 having in that year been appointed Tutor he commenced to give 

 College lectures on the subject ; in the next year he was formally 

 appointed Lecturer on Geology by the College. He had not enjoyed 

 the advantages which are now open to every geological student, 

 but he had fully availed himself of that strenuous training which 

 we are beginning regretfully to look back upon as the good old- 

 fashioned education. Mathematics had impressed upon his mind 

 the real necessities which are demanded by a proof. Classics had 

 assisted him to cultivate a literary gift, and travel had taught him 

 facts at first-hand. Freshness and reality as a natural consequence 

 were the distinctive marks of his Cambridge teaching. Soon after 

 he commenced to lecture, his great contemporary Sedgwick, yielding 

 to failing health and the increasing infirmities of old age, gradually 

 retired from the active work of his Chair, and thus it fell upon 

 Bonney to keep alive the traditions of the Cambridge School of 

 Geology. How thoroughly alive they were kept his numerous 

 pupils may testify. To his pupils he might be said to liave given 

 all he had : he helped them to the utmost of his powers, by lectures, 

 private tuition, friendly advice, and informal teaching in the field ; 

 the last took place during Term in the district around Cambridge, 

 and in Vacation in various remote parts of the British Isles. Nor 

 must the social gatherings be forgotten, when his students made 

 from time to time the acquaintance of the leading geologists of the 



