Vol. 6^.~] ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT. liii 



The criticisms made on his first essay taught him that further 

 study was necessary. He therefore in 1851 betook himself to 

 Geneva, in order to attend the instruction given there by the illus- 

 trious palasontologist, P. J. Pictet. Prom that centre he devoted 

 himself to the task of working out the succession of formations 

 in the district of the Perte du Rhone, and, when only two-and- 

 twenty, produced his now famous memoir on that subject. With 

 the view of still further advancing his scientific training he went 

 in 1854 to Paris, in order to place himself under the teaching 

 of Hebert. While in the French capital he wrote, in conjunction 

 with his master, a memoir in which were described the Num- 

 mulitic fossils from his haunts among the Diablerets and other 

 places in Savoy. This paper was read to the Geological Society of 

 Prance in June 1854. Prom Prance he crossed over to England, 

 where he spent some time in studying more especially the fossils 

 of the Lower Greensand and the fauna of Blackdown. This 

 visit gave him a lifelong personal interest in Britain and British 

 geologists. 



Returning to Lausanne in 1855, he found that his reputation as a 

 promising young man of science had preceded him. In the following 

 year he was appointed to a post in the Academy of Lausanne. At 

 first he gave a course of lectures on zoology, but early in November 

 1859 he exchanged that subject for geology, which then included 

 physical geography, stratigraphy, palaeontology, mineralogy, and 

 petrography. After 1863 his academic range of subjects was 

 fortunately curtailed ; Mineralogy and Palaeontology were made 

 into distinct Chairs, and Petrography was afterwards also separated. 

 In 1890 the Academy having been transformed into a University, 

 Renevier became Professor of Geology and Palaeontology. Thus 

 for half a century he continued to have charge of the instruction 

 in his own favourite departments of science. He was not a lecturer 

 who by the eloquence and impulse of his language fired his students 

 with enthusiasm. But he gained their attention and sympathy in 

 another way. They could not but be impressed with his whole- 

 hearted devotion to his subject, his eagerness to communicate his 

 knowledge, his indomitable persevering application to the problems 

 of which he sought the solution. They were won over, too, by his 

 personal charm, by his patience, his gentleness, his helpfulness, 

 and by the good humour which brightened all his relations with 

 them. He thus became a living force in the educational progress 

 of his country. 



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