THE 



GEOLOGICAL MAGAZINE. 



NEW SERIES. DECADE II. VOL. IX. 



No. I.— JANUARY, 1882. 



oiaia-in:srj^ij ^^irticiliess. 



L — The Life and Work op Linnarsson. 



("With a Portrait.) 



By Charles Lapwoeth, F.G.S. ; 



Professor of Geology, Mason Science College, Birmingham. 



^N the 19tli of last September there passed away from among 

 us one of the most original and successful of the geologists of 

 the century — Dr. Gustaf Linnarsson, the eminent paleeontologist of 

 the Geological Survey of Sweden. His death was so sudden and so 

 unexpected that his sorrowing friends have as yet hardly recovered 

 from their gi-ief and astonishment at the blow, and are not fully 

 awakened to the magnitude of their loss. 



The geologists and palaeontologists of Sweden have long stood 

 pre-eminent in Europe for their enthusiasm, their perseverance, and 

 their extraordinary success. The land of Linnaeus has been, fruit- 

 ful of first-rate scientists. The works of Dalmann, Wahlenberg, 

 Hisinger, and Angelin have made the Lower Palseozoic rocks and 

 fossils of Sweden classic to the geological student. The present 

 Swedish school, which includes within its bounds such men as 

 Nordenskiold, Lindstrom, Lundgren, Torell, and Nathorst, stands 

 second to none in brilliance of scientific talent, in boldness and 

 originality of method, and in the magnitude of the results it has 

 achieved. The wide ocean of dreamy speculation, in whose 

 nebulous ever-receding shores the more imaginative scientists of 

 the South believe that they discern the outlines of undiscovered all- 

 embracing philosophies, has no attraction for these Northerners. 

 They have little respect for the poetry of the science. They are 

 coasters along the shores of Geology, never out of sight of land. 

 But every fresh point sighted is made the stepping-stone to a fresh 

 conquest. No Columbus appears among them to point the way to a 

 new world ; but on the solid ground of patient accumulation of data, 

 and rigid inference therefrom, they are irrepressible and irresistible. 

 The distinct individuality of mind and sturdy independence of thought 

 exhibited by these northern scientists is in marked contrast with the 

 half-hearted gregarious habit of opinion so frequent amongst us. 

 Each investigator carves out his own path, uses his own eyes, tests 

 his own results, and publishes his own conclusions, openly and 

 fearlessly; confident in the assurance' that no scientific party exists 

 in the country sufficiently prejudiced to take offence, or sufficiently 



DECADE II. — VOL. IX. NO. I. 1 



