238 Proceedings of the Royal Society 
the institution wanting help, draws scholars from a wide area of 
country, as is the case with a University. What persons are so 
interested in establishing means of instruction in geology and 
mining, as proprietors of coal, iron, shale, fire-clay, and building 
stones ? or who more able than they, to provide the amount of funds 
necessary to warrant an application to Gfovernment to assist in en- 
dowing professorships for giving that instruction. The counties 
of Fife and Forfar, near St Andrews ; — the counties of Lanark, 
Renfrew, and Ayr, so intimately connected with Glasgow, are all 
rich in mines and minerals. Surely the proprietors and manufac- 
turers of both districts will have patriotism enough to raise, by a 
conjoint effort, the sum which one single individual-— their own 
countryman — though not resident among us, has so cheerfully given. 
I have adverted to this subject so fully, because of the interest 
which our Society, from a very early period, has taken in this 
particular science. Indeed, it is to geology that our Society is 
chiefly indebted for the reputation it first acquired in the scientific 
world, in consequence of the animated and stirring speculations 
and discussions instituted by its members, among whom were Sir 
James Hall, Lord Webb Seymour, Col. Imrie, Hutton, Playfair, 
and Jameson. I believe that little or nothing was known of 
geology, in Great Britain, before the time to which I have 
alluded ; and that even the Geological Society of London, founded 
in the year 1808, owed its origin chiefly to Scotsmen resident 
in England, who had imbibed their taste for the science by taking 
part in the discussions, or studying the transactions of our Society. 
When, from various causes, the science of geology at a later period 
begun to flag in Scotland, our Society lamented and remonstrated, 
and endeavoured to waken public sympathy on the subject. Thus 
the late Principal Forbes, in his address from this chair in the 
year 1862, says 
“Of all the changes which have befallen Scottish science during 
the last half century, that which I most deeply deplore, is the 
progressive decay of our once illustrious geological school.” 
In the year 1865, our Society presented a memorial to the 
Government of which Earl Russell was then head, pointing out the 
inconvenience of there being no separate Professorship of Geology, 
and asking Government to institute one. 
