Vol. 56.] ANNIVERSARY ADDKESS OF THE PRESIDENT. lix 



etc., the age of Bone-caves, and other matters connected with Drift 

 geology he became often involved in controversy ; but in this he 

 was as ready to receive as to give, and, despite his impulsive nature, 

 did not allow scientific differences to degenerate into personal anta- 

 gonism, a feeling for which he was too kind-hearted. 



Dr. Hicks took part in various matters of a more or less public 

 eharacter, and, after giving up general practice, became the head of 

 a large private asylum ; so that the pursuit of geology was his 

 recreation. 



His death came as a sad surprise, none of us being prepared for 

 it. An attack of rheumatic gout last autumn affected his heart, 

 and proved fatal. Not only is the loss of him felt as the greatest 

 among our home-geologists in the past year, but also because we 

 miss the genial, kindly, active presence of my immediate predecessor 

 in this chair. 1 



Lord Hylton (H. H. Jolliffe) was elected a Fellow in 1865, and 

 died on October 30th, 1899. 



Born at Merstham on June 23rd, 1829, he was educated at Eton 

 and Oxford, then entered the Army and served in the Crimean War, 

 taking part in the Charge of the Light Brigade. He was Member 

 of Parliament for Wells from 1855 to 1868, and succeeded to the 

 peerage in 1876. I believe that he was the first to draw the 

 attention of geologists to the fine new railway-cutting at Merstham. 



Sir Frederick McCoy, K.C.M.G., F.B.S., was elected a Fellow 

 of this Society in 1852, and died on May 16th, 1899. He was 

 Murchison Medallist in 1879. 



McCoy was born in Dublin in 1823 and educated at the Universities 

 of that city and of Cambridge for the medical profession, which, 

 however, he afterwards gave up for natural science. He was 

 Sedgwick's assistant at Cambridge, helped Sir Richard Griffith by 

 palseontological work for his geological map of Ireland, afterwards 

 joined the Geological Survey of Ireland, and was made Professor of 

 Geology in the Queen's University, Belfast, in 1850. Four years 

 later he became the first Professor of Natural Science in Melbourne 

 University, a post which he held for the rest of his life. 



His palseontological labours were extensive, and among them are 

 conspicuous the great work (written in conjunction with Sedgwick) 



1 An appreciative notice of Hicks and of his work has been written for the 

 Hoyal Society, for a proof of which I have to thank its author, Prof. Bonney. 



