GuettarcTs Early Career 1 3 the grandson of an apothecary there, he was destined to succeed to the business of compounding and selling drugs.Before he left home for his professional education, he had already developed a passion for natural history pursuits.When still a mere child, he used to accompany his grand- father in his walks, and his greatest happiness was found in collecting plants, asking their names and learning to recognize them, and to distinguish their different parts.Every nook and comer around Etampes became familiar to him, and in later years he loved to revisit, with the eye of a trained naturalist, the scenes which had fascinated his boyhood.In his writings he loses no opportunity of citing his native place for some botanical or geological illustration.Thus, at the very beginning of a long and suggestive memoir on the degradation of mountains, to which further reference will be made in the sequel, his thoughts revert to the haunts of his infancy, and the first illustration he cites of the processes of decay which are discussed in that paper is taken from a picturesque rock overlooking the valley of the Juine, under the shade of which he used to play with his companions.-'^Having gained the favourable notice of the famous brothers Jussieu, who gave renown to the botanical depart- ment of the Jardin des Plantes, he was allowed by his grandfather to choose a career that would afford scope for his ardour in science.Accordingly he became a doctor in medicine.Eventually he was attached to the suite of the Duke of Orleans, whom he accompanied in his travels, Guettard by Condorcet {Oeuvres, edit.1847, vol.iii.p. 220) and to the personal references which I have met with in Guettard's writings.^Memoircs sur diffdrentes parties des Sciences et Arts, tome iii.p. 210 (1770).r Guettard's Geographical Geology 1 7 door.Guettard may be said to have buried his reputation under the weight of material which he left to support it.I cannot pretend to have read through the whole of these ponderous volumes.The leisure of a hard-worked official does not suffice for such a task.But I have perused those memoirs which seemed to me to give the best idea of Guettard's labours, and of the value of his solid contributions to science.And I shall now proceed to give the results of my reading.No one can glance over the kindly doge, by Condorcet without a feeling of respect and sympathy for the man who, under many discouragements, and with but slender means, succeeded in achieving so much in such a wide circle of acquirement.And there is thus no little satisfaction in resuscitating among American and English geologists the memory of a man whom I trust that they will recognize as one of the founders of their science, deserving a place not inferior to that of some whom they have long held in honour.And first with regard to Guettard's labours in the domain of geographical geology, or the distribution of rocks and minerals over the surface of the earth.I have referred to the manner in which he was gradually drawn into this subject by his botanical excursions.As the result of his researches, he communicated in 1746 to the Academy of Sciences in Paris a memoir on the distribution of minerals and rocks.-"^Havingbeen much impressed by the almost entire absence of certain mineral substances in some places, though they were abundant enough in others, he was led to suspect that these substances are 1 Mem.Acad.Roy.Fraiux, vol.for 1751.C The Founders of Geology lect.chemical and other symbols, he placed a sign at each locality where a particular mineral substance was known to exist.Moreover, employing a variety of engraved shading, he showed in a general way the position and limits of the great Paris basin.The marly band surround- ing the central tract of sandy Tertiary strata was represented as sweeping inland from the coast between Boulogne and Dieppe, through Picardy and the east of Prance to the Bourbonnais, where, turning westward, it reached Poitou, and then struck northward to the coast west of the mouth of the Seine.Though erroneously grouping Secondary some- times with Palaeozoic, sometimes with Tertiary strata, and not accurately coinciding with the modern divisions of the stratigraphical series, the map yet roughly expresses the broad distribution of the formations.Having put his data on the map of France, he came to see that his three bands were abruptly truncated by the English Channel and Strait of Dover.Carrying out the I 1 Guettard's Mineralogical Maps 2 1 He found much in these volumes to confirm his surmise.Availing himself of the information afforded by them, he affixed to the map of England the same system of symbols which he had used on that of France, and roughly indicated the limits of his bands across the south-eastern English counties.This portion of his work, however, being founded on second-hand knowledge, is more vague and inaccurate than that which was based on his personal observation in France.The FoMnde7^s of Geology lect. the localities where various metals, minerals and rocks were known to exist.In this way he brought into one view a large amount of information regarding the geogra- phical distribution of the substances which he selected for illustration.This memoir, with its maps, seems to have gratified the Academy of Sciences, for not merely was it inserted in the volume of Transactions for the year, but in the Journal or annual summary of the more important work of the Academy it occupies a conspicuous place.The official record announced that a new application of geography had been inaugurated by the author, who, neglecting the political limits traced on maps, sought to group the different regions of the earth according to the nature of the sub- stances that lie beneath the surface."The work of M. Guettard," it is further remarked, " opens up a new field for geographers and naturalists, and forms, so to speak, a 213 Tnidaine, 51 Unifobmitarianism, 281, 288 United States, progress of the doc- trine of valley -erosion in, 181 ; pre- Cambrian rocks of, 269 Ural Mountains, 84 Valisneri, 5
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