XIV 



eiglity-first year. The date of his election into the Society is January 12, 

 182C* 



The science of Palseontology has sustained a great loss in the death of 

 Hugh Falconer, M.D. Bom at Forres, in the north of Scotland, on 

 the 29th of February, 1808, he received his' early education at the Gram- 

 mar school of that town, and afterwards studied Arts at the University 

 of King's College, Aberdeen, and Medicine at the University of Edinburgh. 

 From the former University he received the degree of A.M. ; and from 

 the latter, in 1829, the degree of M.D. 



As a boy, he exhibited a decided taste for the study of natural objects, 

 which he eagerly followed up in Edinburgh under the systematic tuition of 

 Professors Graham and Jameson. On visiting London in 1829, he availed 

 himself of the opportunity to assist the late Dr. Nathaniel Wallich in the 

 distribution of his great Indian herbarium, and to study the collection of 

 Indian fossil mammalia from the banks of the Irrawaddi, formed by Mr. 

 John Crawfurd during his mission to Ava, and presented by him to the 

 Geological Society. Both occupations proved of material service in his 

 subsequent career, and in the latter instance it determined the labours to 

 which he afterwards so zealously devoted himself. 



In 1830 Dr. Falconer proceeded to India as an Assistant- Surgeon in the 

 H.E.I.C. Service, and arrived in Calcutta in September of that year. 

 Here he at once undertook an examination of fossil bones from Ava, in 

 the possession of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, and published a descrip- 

 tion of them, which at once gave him a recognized position in the roll of 

 cultivators of science in India, and led to his being appointed in 1832 to 

 succeed Dr. Royle as Superintendent of the Botanic Gardens of Suha- 

 runpoor, in the North-western Provinces. 



In the same year (1832) he made an excursion to the Sub-Himalayan 

 range, and from the indication of a specimen in the collection of his friend 

 and colleague, Captain, now Sir Proby T. Cautley, the real nature of 

 which had been previously overlooked, he was led to discover vertebrate 

 fossil remains in situ in the tertiary strata of the Sewalik Hills. The 

 search was speedily followed up with characteristic energy by Captain 

 Cautley in the Kalowala Pass, by means of blasting, and resulted in the 

 discovery of more perfect remains, including miocene mammalian genera. 

 The finding, therefore, of the fossil fauna of the Sewalik Hills was not 

 fortuitous, but a result led up to by researches suggested by previous 

 special study, and followed out with a definite aim. Early in 1834 Dr. 

 Falconer gave a brief account of the Sewalik Hills, desci'ibing their phy- 

 sical features and geological structure, and showing their relation to the 

 Himalayahs (Journ. Asiat. Soc. of Bengal, vol. iii. p. 182). The name 

 Sewalik" had been vaguely applied before then by Rennell and others 

 tp the outer ridges of the true Himalayahs, and the lower elevations towards 



