ANNIVERSARY MEETING LYELL MEDAL AND FUND. 3 I 



and Carboniferous formations of Northern America. No fewer than 

 30 of these papers have appeared in the pages of our own Quarterly 

 Journal. Considering the nature of these numerous contributions, 

 the Council would have been fully justified in awarding to Dr. 

 Dawson one of its Medals, upon the sole ground of the value of their 

 contents ; but these are far from representing the whole of the results 

 of his incessant activity in the pursuit of science. His ' Acadian 

 Geology/ ' Post-pliocene Geology of Canada,' and ' Fossil Plants of 

 the Devonian and Upper Silurian of Canada ' are most valuable con- 

 tributions to our knowledge of North American Geology ; whilst in 

 his ' Archaia,' ' The Dawn of Life,' and other more or less popular 

 writings, he has appealed, and worthily, to a wider public. We are 

 indebted to his researches for nearly all our knowledge of the fossil 

 flora of the Devonian and other Precarboniferous rocks of America, 

 and of the structure and flora of the Nova-Scotian coal-field ; and, 

 finally, I must refer especially to his original investigation of the 

 history, nature, and affinities of Eozoon. These researches are so 

 well known that they have gained for Dr. Dawson a world-wide 

 reputation ; and it is as a slight mark of their esteem, and their high 

 appreciation of his labours, that the Council have awarded to him 

 this Medal, which I will request you to forward to him, with some 

 verbal expression of the feeling with which it is offered. 



Mr. Warington W. Smyth, in reply said — 



That it gave him much pleasure to receive this Medal for Dr. 

 Dawson, who much regretted that he was unable personally to be 

 present, but had addressed a letter to the President expressing his 

 sense of the honour conferred upon him, in the following terms : — 



" I regret that distance and the claims of other duties prevent 

 me from appearing in person to express to the Geological Society 

 my sense of the honour conferred upon me by the award of the 

 Lyell Medal. 



" This expression of approval on the part of those whose good 

 opinion I value so highly is doubly grateful to one who is so deeply 

 sensible of the imperfection of scientific work done in circumstances 

 of isolation from the greater centres of scientific life, and under the 

 pressure of the severe demands made in a new and growing country 

 on those engaged in educational pursuits. 



" It is further especially gratifying to me that this token of your 

 kindly recognition is connected with the illustrious and honoured 

 name of Sir Charles Lyell. Forty years ago the foundation of my 

 geological education was laid by the late Prof. Jameson and other 

 able educators in natural science, his contemporaries, in Edinburgh ; 

 but in so far as I have been able to build any thing worthily on 

 this substructure, the credit is due to the study of the 4 Principles 

 of Geology,' and to the personal friendship and generous kindness 

 of Sir Charles Lyell more than to any other cause." 



