482 Eminent Living Geologists — 



undertake original work. His first paper, " Notice on the occur- 

 rence of Land and Fresh-water Shells with Bones of some Extinct 

 Animals in the Gravel near Cambridge," was read in 1838 before 

 the Cambridge Philosophical Society, but it was not printed until 

 six years afterwards.^ Some notes were contributed to this paper 

 by Sedgwick, and it contained the earliest published record of the 

 Mollusca from the now celebrated Pleistocene deposit of Barnwell. 



In 1838 Mr. Brodie was ordained deacon, and the same year he 

 was appointed curat© to the rector of Wylye, in Wiltshire. The 

 village is situated on the south-western borders of Salisbury Plain, 

 and about four miles to the north of Dinton, in the Vale of Wardour. 

 Here it was that Mr. Brodie became acquainted with that in- 

 teresting geological region, and his researches added further renown 

 to a district already made famous by the observations of Miss Benett 

 and Dr. Fitton. 



Jn May, 1839, Mr. Brodie read his first paper before the Geological 

 Society of London, entitled " A notice on the discovery of the remains 

 of Insects, and a new genus of Isopodous Crustacea belonging to the 

 family Cymothoidee, in the Wealden Formation in the Vale of 

 Wardour, Wilts " (Proc. Geol. Soc, iii, 134). The new Isopod was 

 determined by Professor Owen, and subsequently described by Milne- 

 Edwards under the now familiar name of Arch(soniscus Brodiei. 

 The strata, in one layer of which this fossil occurs in profusion, 

 have since been grouped with the Purbeck Beds. 



Mr. Brodie was admitted to priest's orders in 1839, and he stayed 

 barely two years in his Wiltshire parish. In 1840 he became curate 

 to the vicar of Steeple Claydon, in Buckinghamshire, and entered 

 a region of Oxford Clay and Drift in the vale of Bicester, and 

 a famous hunting country. Steeple Claydon is about four miles south 

 of Buckingham, where the Lower Oolites come to the surface ; but 

 Mr. Brodie's observations were directed to the country further south, 

 where he found at Quainton Hill, and at Stone, near Aylesbury, 

 outliers of Portland and Purbeck beds possessing "a certain similarity 

 with those in Wiltshire, but with clearly marked local difierences." 

 Staying but a few months at Steeple Claydon, his discovery of remains 

 of Insects and other fossils in the "Wealden" (Purbeck) sti'ata of 

 Buckinghamshire was published after he had left the district 

 (Proc. Geol. Soc, iii, 780). 



In 1841 Mr. Brodie was appointed Eector of Down Hatherley 

 in the' Vale of Gloucester, and about five miles west of Cheltenham. 

 Here he came into a richly fossiliferous region of Lias and Oolites, 

 and here he had also the advantage of many fellow workers in 

 geology. Strickland's home at Cracombe House, Evesham, was not 

 far away to the north, and those of Dr. Wright and James Buckman 

 lay a few miles to the east. W. S. Symonds, afterwards Kector of 

 Pendock, was from 1843-5 Curate of Offenham, near Evesham ; 

 and Lycett must about this time have commenced his labours at 

 Minchinhampton. It was not long before Mr. Brodie announced 

 his discovery of Insect-remains in the Lower Lias in Gloucestershire, 



^ Trans. Cambridge Phil. Soc, viii, 138. 



