538 Proceedings of the Royal Society 
mineralogical investigation. I was at this time intimately ac- 
quainted with Haidinger, and could well appreciate his mineralo- 
gical facility and acuteness, his varied knowledge of natural history 
and physical science, and his remarkable command of languages, — 
so that, for example, in our own tongue, he could tell a jocular 
story, make a pun, and extemporise a clever couplet,— -which I 
take to be about the severest of all tests of a man’s familiarity with 
a foreign language. 
No one who knew him at that time could fail to see that 
Haidinger would one day become a man of mark among the 
mineralogists of his own land, to which he returned soon after 
completing his labours in Mr Allan’s museum. He then travelled 
for some time with Mr Allan’s son, Eobert, who died a few years 
ago a Fellow of this Society; and the main object of the travellers 
was the pursuit of mineralogy. Ere long Mohs died, and Haidinger 
succeeded him in his University Chair. His office put him natu- 
rally at the head of all relative Government undertakings, which 
in their turn brought him promotion, till at length he filled the 
highest office in his profession, that of Director of the Mineralo- 
gical and Geological Survey of Austria. For his many scientific 
and practical services to his country he received from his sovereign 
the honour of knighthood a few years before his death, which took 
place last April in, as I understand, the 71st year of his age. 
Coming nearer home, I have next to deal with the scientific life 
of another lost Honorary Fellow of the highest rank in Physical 
Philosophy, Sir Roderick Impey Murchison, Baronet. But 
though very willing, and not altogether unable, to do justice to 
his remarkable labours in his science, I felt that I should be acting 
with injustice to his memory, and to the claims of a far superior 
biographer and eulogist, if I did not transfer from myself to Pro- 
fessor Geikie the pleasing task of recalling to our recollection the 
main points in the life and the work of his patron and friend. 
The following summary is accordingly the tribute which Professor 
G-eikie has kindly enabled the Society to pay to the fame of Sir 
Roderick Murchison : — 
“ Among our recent losses there is none which we have more 
reason to deplore than bis. The name of Sir Roderick Murchison 
