150 The American Geolog ist. March, 1892 
but in the fall following he became assistant in chemistry and 
natural science at his alma mater. He was brought especially 
under the influence of his teacher and warm personal friend, 
Prof. Henry B. Nason, whose influence was largely instrumental 
in shaping his subsequent career. During this period he made 
the tests of slates from the region about his home, whose pub- 
lished results are subsequently cited. In 1885 the Polytechnic 
Institute conferred on him the additional degree of B. §. 
During the summer of 1884, he traveled in northern Europe, 
visiting the North Cape and the mines of Sweden and Norway. 
In the autumn, acting on the advice of professor Nason he matri- 
culated at the university of Gottingen, and became one in a long 
and honorable list of American scientific men who have received 
their preparation at this famous seat of learning. While at 
G6ttingen his work lay especially in mineralogy and petrography 
under the guidance of professor Carl Klein, now of Berlin, and 
in chemistry under professor Victor Meyer. 
In the spring of 1885 he traveled through Italy and Sicily with 
professor Klein, and later was assigned the subject of his thesis 
in one of the extinct voleanoes of the former land. Through 
professor Klein, Dr. Williams came to know personally professor 
Rosenbusch of Heidelberg, to whose kind advice he was after- 
wards indebted in his American work. During the Italian trip 
referred to above, professor Klein had been given some specimens 
of igneous rock from Monte Amiata, an extinct voleanic pile that 
rises near the classic lake Trasimenus and forms the highest peak 
in Tuscany. They proved of such interest that they were en- 
trusted to Dr. Williams, as suggestive for his thesis. With char- 
acteristic energy and thoroughness he proceeded to the region in 
1885, and accompanied by a Swiss helper and a local Italian 
guide, he spent several weeks on the mountain, either camping or 
lodging in the little country inns. After his return to Gottingen 
he anticipated taking his doctorate in the summer of 1886, but 
the sudden call of professor Klein to Berlin, necessitated holding 
the examinations in the spring. He received his degree magma 
cum laude. His thesis was afterward published in the Newes 
Jahrbuch, and gained great praise in America as well as abroad. 
The paper is accompanied by four partial and twenty-two com- 
plete analyses of rocks, and by an elaborate map and three pano- 
ramic views. Its Special interest lies in this. It traces the differ- 
