182 Reports and Proceedings — 



this award, I do so •with the greater pleasure because I feel that it is not only an 

 honour to myself, but is an indication of the goodwill which exists between the 

 Geological Society and the members of the Geological Survey. If anything could 

 enhance the value of the award in my estimation, it would be receiving it, as I do to- 

 day, from the hands of one who, standing in the foremost rank of anatomists and 

 palaeontologists, is so competent to judge of such work as mine, and who by kind and 

 gentle sjTupathy has not only encouraged investigation , but gained the warmest regards 

 of all who have come within the circle of his influence. 



In presenting the Murchison Medal to Dr. Henry Woodward, F.R.S., the President 

 said: — Dr. Henry Woodward, — The Council has awarded you the Murchison Medal 

 and a grant of ten guineas in recognition of your valuable researches into the struc- 

 ture and classification of the fossil Crustacea especially of the Merostomata and 

 Trilobita, and your services to the progress of geology in Great Britain by your 

 conduct of the Geological Magazine for nearly twenty years. Tour Monograph 

 on the "Merostomata," published by the Palasontographical Society, and your 

 " Catalogue of British Fossil Crustacea, with their synonyms and the range in time of 

 each genus and order," will long continue to be works of reference indispensable to 

 every student of these interesting life-forms. But valuable as are these written 

 records, they discover but a small part of ihe services you have rendered in the 

 advancement of our science. How much more you have done by the assistance you 

 have so freely given to all who have sought your help at the Museum in deciphering 

 some difficult matters in palaeontology will never be fully known. 



Dr. WooDWAKD, in reply, said : — Mr. President, — I cannot, I fear, adequately 

 express my thanks to the Council for the honour they have conferred upon me this 

 day in awarding me the Murchison Medal. This mark of their esteem is peculiarly 

 appropriate, since its founder, Sir Roderick Murchison, was for many years one of the 

 most active of the Trustees of the British Museum, under whom I have now had the 

 honour to serve for the past twenty-six years. Since my election to the Geological 

 Society, twenty years ago, I cannot but recall that the Council has upon two former 

 occasions (in 1866 and 1879) encouraged and assisted me in my scientific work by an 

 award. I feel, however, that the Medal now bestowed by you. Sir, is a far higher 

 recognition of my scientific labours, and one which gives them the stamp of the 

 approval of the Geological Society. I thank you for alluding to the Geological 

 Magazine, now in its twentieth year, and which (saving the first year, when it was 

 edited in conjunction with Prof. T. Enpert Jones) I have personally carried on since 

 its commencement. I believe it has had its uses, serving not only as a sluice-gate in 

 times of emergency to let off the overflowing productions of pent-up Fellows thirst- 

 ing for publication, but also as a convenient and ready method of printing short papers, 

 which might be deemed too ephemeral for admission into the Society's Journal. 

 Although, for the past four years, my time has been so very largely taken up with the 

 removal of the Geological Collections from Bloomsbury and their rearrangement in 

 Cromwell Eoad as to preclude almost entirely the possibility of doing original 

 scientific work, I trust it will not always be so, but that shortly I may give some 

 evidence of being worthy of the honour I have received this day ; and those palaeon- 

 tologists who have visited and consulted the collections since their removal can best 

 appreciate how those four years have been spent, and with what result, in the better 

 display of the great collections now under my charge. 



The President then handed the balance of the proceeds of the Murchison 

 Geological Fund to Mr. R. Etheridge, F.R.S., for transmission to Mr. Martin 

 Simpson, of Whitby, and addressed him as follows : — Mr. Etheridge, — The balance 

 of the proceeds of the Murchison Donation Fund has been awarded by the Council 

 to Mr. M. Simpson, Curator of the Whitby Museum. He has devoted much atten- 

 tion to the fossils of that district, and he is the author of two books descriptive of 

 them. The Council hopes that this cheque may be of assistance to him in continuing 

 the useful extra-official work he has long been carrying on in that locality. 



Mr. Etheridge, in reply, expressed the pleasure that it gave him to receive, on 

 behalf of Mr. Simpson, this testimony of the Society's appreciation of the life-long 

 labours of one wlio had pursued palaeontological studies with so much devotion, and 

 read a letter which he had received from Mr. Simpson. 



The President next handed the Lyell Medal to Professor W. H. Flower, F.R.S., 

 for transmission to Dr. Joseph Leidy, F.M.G.S., and addressed him as follows: — 

 Prof. Flower,— The Council has^bestowed on Dr. J. Leidy the Lyell Medal, with a 



