JOHN PHILLIPS, F.R.S. 
127 
and their relationship to Alpine limestones, which had then begun to 
be recognized. They made careful measures of the slatey and sandy 
beds full of shells which there overlie the ironstone and the lias, 
contemplating a joint memoir as to their position and numerous 
fossil contents. 
Dr. Giekie, in his " Life of Sir Roderick Murchison," has recorded 
the latter's recollections of the first meeting of the British Associa- 
tion at York: — " This first gathering of men of science to give a 
more systematic direction to their researches, to gather funds for 
carrying out analyses and enquiries, to gain strength and influence 
by union, and to make their voice tell in all those public affairs 
in which science ought to tell, came about in this wise. Assemblies 
of ' naturforscher had been for two years or more in existence in 
Germany, having begun in Hamburg. Thereon, Sir David Brewster 
wrote an article in the Edinhiwgh Pldlosophical Journal suggesting 
that such a meeting should be tried in Britain. On this the Rev. 
Wm. Vernon (afterwards Vernon Harcourt), the third son of the 
Archbishop of York, and a Prebendary of York, not only made the real 
beginning by proposing that we should meet at York, but by engaging 
his father to act as a patron, and by inducing Earl Fitzwilliam to be the 
president, he gave at once a locus standi and respectability to the project. 
But he did more, for he elaborated a constitution of that which he 
considered must become a parliament of science such as Bacon had 
imagined, and was thus our law-giver. The project thus elaborated 
having been transmitted to me in London in the spring of 1831, when 
I was president of the Geological Society, I at once eagerly sup- 
ported it ; nay, more, I wrote and lithographed an appeal to all my 
scientific friends, particularly the geologists, urging them to join this 
new association. But notwithstanding my energy, the scheme was 
for the most part pooh-poohed, and among my own associates I only 
induced Mr. Greenough, Dr. Daubeny, Sir Philip Egerton, and Mr. 
Yates to follow suit . .John Phillips, of York, the nephew of Wm. 
Smith, and the curator of the York Museum, had very much to do 
in the origin of this concern, for he co-operated warmly with Wm. 
Vernon, and when we got together at York was the secretary and 
factotum. He had already corresponded with me in Londmi, and 
