DEATH OF DEAN BUCK LAND, 
27 r 
“ My preface and the three lines of dedication to De la 
Beche, with a map literally made from the Government 
surveys, prevent all further dispute. 
“ Ever your sincere friend, 
“ Roderick Murchison.” 
Dean Buckland died August 14th, 1856, at the advanced 
age of seventy-three. He was buried at the west end of 
the churchyard at Islip. The spot, which was selected by 
himself, lay beside the terrace gravel walk with its row of 
elms. From it he had often taken his children to gaze on 
the beautiful sunsets lighting up the wide stretch of low, 
level landscape, with Kidlington spire “ pointing up to 
heaven like a needle,” he would say, in the golden haze 
which melted into the purple of the Witham Hills on 
the distant horizon. Curiously enough, his grave had to 
be hewn out of the solid limestone, and blasting powder 
was used in considerable quantities to excavate the 
rock. Mrs. Buckland restored the chancel, at the cost of 
^500, in memory of the Dean, and replaced Dr. South’s 
very ugly east window by new stone tracery, which, after 
her death at St. Leonards in the following year, November 
1857, her children filled with stained glass, to the memory 
of both their parents. 
With the permission of the Dean and Chapter his children 
placed a monumental bust in the south aisle of Westminster 
Abbey, near the door leading to the cloisters. The follow¬ 
ing is the inscription on the plinth, written by the Rev. the 
Sub-Dean, Lord John Thynne :— 
