72 The Americav Geologist. February, 1895 
of roek-niasses b}' liis work for the United States Geological 
Surve}^ when under the direction of Clarence King (1876), 
but there were then few American students in Germany im- 
bibing this new knowledge, and as few at home to whom Zir- 
kel's work appealed. In 1879 there were probabl}' not a dozen 
men here who were making serious efforts in this new depart- 
iire, but of these professor Emerson, alive to every phase of 
his science, was one. Mr. Williams' interest was enlisted un- 
der these influences, and he was led to seek, the follow^ing 
year, the well-springs of such knowledge at Gottingen and 
Heidelberg. Meanwhile, however, he returned for a brief 
period during the spring of 1879, to Utica and taught vari- 
ous sciences in the academy which he had left five years be- 
fore. Though in this capacity biit for two or three months, 
he infused such a degree of enthusiasm in his pupils for every 
subject he touched upon as to render the writer's task as his 
successor a difficult one. Emerson had graduated at G()ttin- 
gen during the life-time of that versatile geologist, von See- 
bach, and to Gottingen he naturally sent his pupil. There 
Ehrenberg, thirty years before, had turned the microscope 
upon the rocks, searching for their minutest organisms; von 
Waltershausen had done his immortal work on volcanoes, and 
Klein, now of Berlin and the foremost of jihysical mineralo- 
gists, was then lecturing. Here in the winter and summer 
semesters of 1879-80 Williams heard these lectures by Klein 
and those by Hiibner in chemistry. The next year he changed 
to Heidelberg, where was and is Rosenbusch, a name which in- 
creasing numbers of Americans delight to honor, and there 
was begun a friendship between instructor and pupil which 
death alone could interrupt. After two years of work, prin- 
cipally with this inspiring man, he went up for his examina- 
tion in December, 1882, achieving his degree with honor. 
Upon too many of the young Americans who throng the 
German universities the glamor of the doctorate exerts a pal- 
pably unwholesome influence. The title here passes for more 
than its face value and, unhappily, it matters little whence it 
comes. When a well-directed public sentiment shall have re- 
stored to its proper dignity the now disordered and cheapened 
title, professor, the doctorate maj^ resume its appropriate sub- 
sidiary place. With Williams the attainment of this degree 
