255 
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICES OF EMINENT YORKSHIRE GEOLOGISTS. 
II. “ADAM SEDGWICK.” BY T. M 4 KENNY HUGHES, M.A., 
WOOD WARDIAN PROFESSOR OF GEOLOGY, CAMBRIDGE. 
The story of Adam Sedgwick carries us back through years full of 
stirring events, to times very different from our own, whether we 
regard the changes of the political world or the march of scientific 
discovery. 
In a letter written when he was an old man, he says : — 44 On 
the 22nd of this month I shall have completed my 78th year, and 
78 such eventful years! I well remember the breaking up of the 
old monarchy of France, the death of Louis XVI., the 44 reign of 
terror,” the excitement which reached every nook and corner of 
this island, the early struggles for the abolition of the slave trade 
These things stand out among the remembrances of my early 
boyhood. Then followed the rise of Napoleon, the falling down 
of kingdoms, the threat of invasion, the phantom of old England’s 
doom, and of a despotic empire which was to be built over the 
graves of national liberty and Christian freedom. Then came the 
great providential change, a victory gained over a gigantic military 
despotism, not by the arms of man, but by the powers of nature 
which are the might of God’s strength in the workings of His 
providence. And the same years, tell us in their history, of the rise 
of England’s most anomalous and portentous display of power in the 
Eastern Continent. And during the same years we have seen the 
rise of England’s children in the New World of the far West. First 
breaking off from the parent stock and vindicating their national 
freedom ; then with all the energy of their race (and with all the 
benefits of the political freedom of Western Europe), starting on a 
new road towards political strength and national greatness, and 
advancing on it at a speed unmatched in the past history of man. 
44 And the triumph of sciences have gone hand in hand with 
these great world-wide movements ; or perhaps it would be nearer 
the truth to say, that science has been their main spring and living 
