Biographical Sketch of ElkanaJi Billitigs. — Ami. 271 
late at night he was at his desk, and later at home into the 
hours of night he carried on his studies, and thus accomplished 
much in those twenty years of official connection with the 
Geological Survey of Canada. 
Billings left behind hmi a large amount of unfinished work, 
numerous and important lists of organic remains bearing up- 
on the geology of the older provinces. Many of these lists 
would form most important contributions to Canadian geol- 
ogy, should they ever be published. As noted by Dr. Whit- 
eaves in his obituary sketch and In Mciiioriaiii paper, Vol. 8, 
No. 5, Canadian Naturalist and Quarterly Journal of Sci- 
ence, p. 261, "Mr. Billings died before he could describe 
the whole of the material he had studied and carefully 
examined, including collections by Sir William E. Logan 
and Professor (now) Dr. Robert Bell, in Gaspe. by Mr. 
T. C. Weston, at Arisaig; T. Curry, at Port Daniel and Bay 
of Chaleurs. The whole of the material from these localities 
had been carefully examined, and it only^ remained to write 
the descriptions of the different species, but this, alas, he was 
not destined to accomplish." Those who had the pleasure 
and privilege to know Mr. Billings, state that he was char- 
acterized "by great firmness and decision and an unswerving 
love of truth and justice, and by an unaffected and winning 
modesty of demeanor." 
During his lifetime Mr. Billings received many tokens of 
appreciation. In 1867 the Natural History Society voted him 
its silver medal for "his life-long efforts for the promotion of 
science in Canada." He was awarded a bronze medal (in 
Class L) by the jurors of the International Exhibition of 
London in 1862, and a similar one at the Paris Exposition of 
1867. 
To do him honor and indicate to the world of science what 
Billings did for Canadian geology, many a paleontologist in 
America and Europe has described genera and species after 
him. The genera Billingsia, Billingsite, Billingsella and El- 
kania have been erected by Walcott, Hall, Ford and Hyatt, 
whilst upwards of thirty species of corals, crinoids, brachio- 
pods, lamellibranchs, molluscs, cephalopods, ostracods, tri- 
lobites and other fossil organic remains bear his name. 
