SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



i73 



BOOK5TOREAD 



NOTICES BY JOHN T. CARRIXGION. 



A Memoir of William Ptngelly, F.R.S. Edited by 

 Hester Pexgellv, 341 pp. royal Svo, illustrated 



his time, and the instructor of princes. The book 

 before us is the history of such a life, and in telling 

 the story, if his daughter has erred, it has been on 

 the side of modesty in raising this monument to 

 her father's memory. Born at East Looe, Corn- 

 wall, in 1S12, we may possibly find a clue to 

 Pengelly's heredity of genius from his mother's 

 side, whose maiden name was Prout, the celebrated 

 water-colour artist, William Prout, being of her 

 family. His father's descent was through a long 

 line of seafaring men of courage and adventure. 

 At twelve years of age the great geologist that 

 was to be left school for ever and joined his father 

 on board his little vessel. There he remained 



HISTORIC Man FOUND NEAR MENTONE. 

 (From " Memoir of William Ptngelly.") 



with portrait and 10 plates. (London : John 

 Murr. : 



The association of the name of William I'engelly, 

 geologist, of Torquay, with the early hist 

 man in the British Islands has a world-wide 

 reputation His life is one of those examples 

 which in these times of high education can rarely 

 be expected to reoccur — where a man rises from 

 lowly estate to be among the highest of his 

 scientific contemporaries Indeed, it would hardly 



much to entitle e, if a tltli 



Deeded. "From I Literally 



with n ml that ol 



and the village teacher, in a 



village. William I'engelly slowly but certainly 

 became the associate of the brightest intellects of 



occupied in small coasting voyages, and associating 

 only with rough uneducated men for some four of 

 his most impressionable years. At the age of 

 sixteen he left the sea, and for several years 

 longer loafed about his native village, picking up 

 .-irious living, but at the same time storing 

 his mind with every scrap of knowledge he could 

 attain in such a place as Looe, from the scanty 

 literature available for a boy of his position, dui Ing 

 the first quarter of this century. "My only 

 chanc<\ William I'engelly of those day,, 



"of obtaining a i through an old pedlai 



who occasionally visited our village, and of him i 

 'Euclid. 1 Well do I remember 



the delight with which on one occasion 1 purche ed 

 twenty volumes of books at a second-hand shop at 



