lvi PKOCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [May IQOO 



men ; the result was that his firm commanded markets of which 

 they could not have dreamed some time ago. 



Sorby states that it was the study of meteorites which led him 

 to invent the spectrum-microscope, with an arrangement for 

 obtaining direct vision. He applied this instrument to the studv 

 of organic colouring-matter, and published altogether some forty 

 papers on the subject. It is probable, however, that a brilliant 

 future still awaits this instrument, and that it will find an important 

 application in petrographical investigation. 



After the death of his mother, to whom he was deeply attached, 



Sorby lived on board his yacht — a veritable floating laboratory 



for five months of each year from 1879 to 1903, when he met with 

 an accident which confined him to his bed. He endured this 

 restraint upon his liberty with the utmost cheerfulness, and con- 

 tinued his work no less ardently than before. His last paper, 

 written under these adverse circumstances, was read before the 

 Society on January 8th, 1908, and it betrays no decay of power. 

 It is distinguished by acuteness of observation, ingenuity in experi- 

 ment, soundness of judgement, fertility in suggestion, and, not least, 

 by a constant endeavour to obtain numerical results — the same 

 characteristics, indeed, as are to be found in all his work. 



Dr. Sorby was elected a Fellow of this Society in 1850. and in 

 1869 he received the Wollaston Medal. He held the office of 

 President in 1878 and 1879, and delivered two memorable addresses 

 which are important contributions to original research. His address 

 when President of the Geological Section of the British Association 

 was also a piece of original work. He was elected a Fellow of the 

 Eoyal Society in 1857, and delivered the Bakerian Lecture in 1863. 

 In 1874 he received a Eoyal Medal for his researches in slaty 

 cleavage and on the minute structure of minerals and rocks, for the 

 construction of a micro-spectroscope, and for his researches on 

 colouring-matters. The University of Cambridge conferred upon 

 him the honorary degree of LL.D. in 1879. From the Dutch Society 

 of Sciences of Haarlem he received the first large Boerhaave Medal, 

 which is only awarded once in twenty years. He was President of 

 the Council and Chairman of the Executive Committee of Firth 

 College (which he did much to found), from 1883 till its absorption 

 into the University of Sheffield in 1897. He was the first Presi- 

 dent of the Yorkshire Naturalists' Union ; but it was in the rooms 

 of the Literary & Philosophical Society of his native city that he 

 found himself most at home. From the commencement of his 



