PKOCEEDINGS of the geological society. 



Gtjglielmo Gttiscaedi, who was born in Naples in March 1821 y 

 was educated for the profession of an architect. When he was 24 

 years o£ age, however, the meeting of a Scientific Congress at 

 Naples, which he attended in order to learn something about 

 building-materials, seems to have directed his attention to the I 

 interest attaching to geological studies. Entering the class of the 

 veteran mineralogist Professor Scacchi in the University of Naples, 

 Guiscardi soon became the most distinguished of his pupils. The 

 revolution of 1848 found the young geologist in the ranks of the 

 army which endeavoured to overthrow the Bourbon dynasty in 

 Naples ; but on the failure of that attempt, he retired to a private 

 life of intense study for the next twelve years. The victory of the 

 national cause, to which he was so greatly attached, came at last, 

 however, and he was then in 1860 appointed Professor of Geology 

 in the University of Naples, a post which he retained till the time 

 of his death. Professor Guiscardi was a man of very wide culture 

 and extensive knowledge, as was shown by his palseontological 

 papers on the genera Nerita and Aturia, on the family of the 

 Eudistes, and those on the fossils found in blocks ejected from 

 Vesuvius, by his petrographical papers on the rocks of Vesuvius and 

 the Phlegrsean fields, and by his chemical researches on the gases 

 escaping from volcanic vents. He was elected a Foreign Corre- 

 spondent of this Society in 1879. Many of our members can bear 

 testimony to the cordiality with which foreign students of his science 

 were always welcomed at Naples by our esteemed Correspondent, 

 who ever showed himself ready to assist them in their researches ; 

 I can myself never forget the kindness which I received from one 

 with whom I contracted a warm friendship. For some years past an 

 affection of the eyes had caused him much suffering and anxiety, and 

 he died at Naples on the 11th December, 1885, at the age of 64. 



Feancois Leopold Cokjstet was born at Givry in Belgium on the 

 21st February, 1834. At the age of 16 he entered as a student the 

 " Ecole des Mines " of Hainault, and, obtaining his diploma in 1853, 

 became a mining engineer. For some years he was engaged in the 

 direction of the operations of several coal-mines, and in this capacity 

 he introduced two notable improvements into the working of the 

 Belgian collieries, namely the employment of compressed air as a 

 motive power, and the use of the endless chain for transport 

 purposes. Forming the acquaintance of another mining engineer, 

 M. A. Briart, now an esteemed Foreign Correspondent of this Society, 



