226 Biographical Memoir of Sir William Herschel. 
logues already mentioned. This paper was, we believe, the 
last that Sir William published. His health had now begun 
to decline, and, on the 25th of August 1822, he sunk under 
the infirmities of age, after having completed his eighty-fourth 
year. In 1788 Sir William Herschel married the widow of 
the late John Pitt, Esq., who has survived him. His union 
with this lady was to him a source of unclouded happiness, and 
cherished that tranquillity in his domestic circle, so essential to 
the peaceful occupations of science. Sir William left behind him 
an only son, the present Mr John F. W. Herschel * *. At an age 
comparatively early, this eminent individual has taken a high 
station among the most distinguished mathematicians and natural 
philosophers of the present day. His name and his discoveries 
have already adorned our humble pages, and we trust that 
many of them will yet be occupied in recording his future la- 
bours. O. 
Edinburgh, Feb. 1. 1823. 
Art. II. — On Fossil Organic Remains as a Geognostic Cha- 
racter. By Alexander Biiongniart, Member of the In- 
stitute of France, & c. &c. *j- 
It was remarked more than a hundred years ago, that there 
almost always occurred differences between the shell-fish and 
other animals which at present live in the seas and on the sur- 
face of the earth, and those which occur in a fossil state in all 
countries. This first view has been confirmed by a more detailed 
examination, and has by degrees led to another, which maintains, 
that the deposits of organic remains buried in the crust of the 
earth, are arranged, as it were, by successive generations, in 
such a manner, that all the remains of any one deposit have a 
* A detailed account of Sir William Herschel’s Life and Discoveries, with a 
collection of his best papers, will, we anxiously hope, be soon given to the public 
by Mr Herschel. 
*J* From Cuvier’s work on Fossil Organic Remains , in progress of publica- 
tion. 
