
Ture NortTHERN MicRoScoPIsT. 


NO: MAY. 1882. 


PREPARATION OF TRANSPARENT SECTIONS 
OF ROCKS AND MINERALS. 
BYeakins Gay SORBY,, lelaDs 2hoRici, 8c 
A Paper read before the Sheffield Microscopical Society, March 3rd, 1882. 
[’ is generally stated that Mr. Witham was the first to introduce 
the method of preparing thin sections of stony material for 
use with the Microscope. He published many years ago a work 
on the Microscopical structure of fossil wood, but I think it is 
very much open to doubt whether he was the man who invented 
that method. 
A good many years ago I had the pleasure of making the 
acquaintance of Mr. Nichol, of Edinburgh, well known as the 
inventor of ‘‘ Nichol’s Prism.” He was about seventy years of 
age, and was a very fine man indeed for that age. He had an 
exceedingly interesting collection of sections of wood and minerals, 
and he told me that it was he who originated the method of 
preparing thin sections of fossil wood for the use of the Micro- 
scope, and that Mr. Witham did not write that book. It was 
written for him, and the author had special instructions given to 
him never to allude to Mr. Nichol. He is now dead, however, 
and I suspect that all who knew about the circumstances are also 
dead, but I am inclined to believe that Mr. Witham bought his 
sections of fossil wood from Mr. Nichol, and had the book written 
for him, and he thus got the credit of being the first to introduce 
the method. 
Of course we have not now the opportunity of ascertaining 
what was Mr. Witham’s view upon the matter; but in any case 
there can be no doubt that Mr. Witham’s book was the first 
account of the method by means of which sections of fossil wood 
could be prepared so as to be examined as transparent objects 
with the Microscope. 
eae after that a similar method was adopted by Professor 
OL. 12 



