DECEMBER 13, 1918] 
The completion of this piece of research on 
sponges marked a turning point in Hinde’s 
life. From that time until his death, while he 
at intervals wrote short papers on other sub- 
jects, he devoted himself almost exclusively to 
the description of the fossil sponges of Great 
Britain. After receiving the degree of doctor 
of philosophy at Munich, Hinde was asked by 
the Keeper of the Geological Department of 
the British Museum to arrange the large col- 
lections of fossil sponges. At first it was 
thought that the task would not be very diffi- 
cult but, on account of the necessity of ma- 
king a microscopic study of the spicules of 
every specimen and of redescribing each species 
in scientific terms, it was found that a consid- 
erable period of time and extra financial sup- 
port would have to be allowed for the research, 
and it is gratifying to note that neither ap- 
preciation of the value of such work nor money 
for its carrying on was lacking. As a result, 
there appeared in 1883 a quarto volume bear- 
ing the title “ Catalogue of the Fossil Sponges 
in the Geological Department of the British 
Museum.” But this was no mere catalogue, no 
mere listing of numbered specimens with a 
word or two of description, it was a masterly 
treatment, the first one of its kind in English, 
on the anatomy, structure, classification and 
distribution of fossil sponges, accompanied by 
illustrations of entire specimens and skeletal 
elements of all of the more important Paleozoic 
and Mesozoic genera of sponges in Great 
Britain, and the work was made particularly 
valuable by the addition of notes on the occur- 
rence of the British species in other European 
localities, so that one may learn also of the 
faunal distribution of the sponges and the 
stratigraphic correlation of their horizons. 
The types of a large number of species founded 
by such early workers as Mantell, Toulmin 
Smith, Phillips and Miss Bennett were refig- 
ured and redescribed so that one need no longer 
rely upon the unscientific protologs and super- 
ficial photographs given by these and other au- 
thors. Hinde used Zittel’s classification and 
adopted his method of study of spicules 
throughout the work, giving to the world a 
monograph which will always remain a stand- 
SCIENCE 
589 
ard work of reference. In recognition of his 
service to science in carrying on these elabo- 
rate researches the Geological Society of Lon- 
don in 1882 awarded to Hinde the Wollaston 
“Donation Fund.” 
The “Catalogue” was, however, only a 
rather general work covering the sponges of all 
periods. Hinde next undertook the detailed 
study of all British species in successive geo- 
logie systems. Thus, in 1887 he published in 
the Paleontographical Society (Vol. XL., 92 
pp., 8 plates) the first part of “ A Monograph 
of the British Fossil Sponges.” It was the 
first treatise in any country to contain a ré- 
sumé and evaluation of the literature on fossil 
sponges, two hundred and thirty-two papers 
and books being cited. In addition, it included 
a careful discussion of the structure and 
morphological characters of sponges, as well 
as a description of the types of spicules, and 
to-day this-remains the only book in English 
where such features are found adequately de- 
seribed. The remainder of this first part and 
all of the second part (published in 1888) were 
devoted to the systematic description of the 
Paleozoie species of Great Britain and the 
figuring thereof. In 1893 a similar volume 
(part ITI.) was published covering the Jurassic 
sponges, and it was Hinde’s intention to take 
up the very large Cretaceous fauna in the same 
way. But, unless this fourth part has ap- 
peared within the last year or so and copies of 
it have not yet reached this country, the mono- 
graph has not been completed and the most 
abundant, the most perfectly preserved of the 
sponge faunas of Great Britain must wait until 
some new worker appears to carry on this diffi- 
cult task in a field where only a specialist of 
first rank would have the temerity to follow 
such a leader. 
In 1897 Hinde was honored a second time by 
the Geological Society of London which 
awarded to him the Lyell Medal with the sum 
of twenty-five pounds in recognition of his re- 
searches in geology and paleontology and espe- 
cially of his discoveries of fossil sponges and 
other minute organisms. Previously in 1886, 
he had been made one of the assistant editors 
