PREFACE. 
viii 
ship at Cambridge. His wit, humour, and eloquence 
attracted both young and old, and the memory of his 
geological expeditions had not perished when I was an 
undergraduate in 1859. His rooms at Christ Church, to 
which he had migrated on his appointment as Canon, 
became a centre of attraction for all who cared for the new 
learning that by this time was grievously vexing the minds 
of mediaeval Oxford. How strong was the feeling of anta¬ 
gonism, even after many years, may be estimated by the 
pious ejaculation of Dean Gaisford in 1852: “ Buckland 
has gone to Italy, and we shall hear no more, thank God, 
of this geology ! ” They were, however, to hear more, both 
of this and of other things too, until the spirit of narrow 
intolerance received its crushing defeat in the memorable 
Darwinian controversy in i860. In this widening of 
thought, and in sweeping away the old worn-out ideas 
of Nature, Buckland did most important service to the 
University. Single-handed, he brought about a revival 
in the direction of natural science, analogous to the 
movement in religious thought brought about by Newman 
and the Oriel School. 
The phrase “ gnoscitur e sociis ” applies to all men, but 
with peculiar force to a professor. Buckland was in close 
touch with the most brilliant men of the day and of most 
varied pursuits. Whately, Whewell, Sir Robert Peel, 
Cuvier, Humboldt, Liebig, and Sir Joseph Banks were 
among his friends. It is, however, by his influence on his 
students that he can best be measured. Among these, two 
young Christ Church men may be mentioned—Viscount 
Cole, afterwards the Earl of Enniskillen, and Philip Egerton, 
