THE LIFE OF WILLIAM SMITH.
The succession of the strata recognized—Strata known by their
fossils, position, and mineral contents—England surveyed by
Smith and made the type of the results of the succession of
changes studied by geology.
The ancestors of William Smith were a race of farmers who owned small
tracts of land, and had been settled in Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire
for many generations.
William Smith was born at Churchill, a village in Oxfordshire, on
the 23rd of March, 1769, the year which gave birth to Cuvier. Of his
parents he always spoke with great regard, but there is little in the
recollections which he has preserved of them, to show in what degree
they contributed to form his remarkable character. His father he
described as “a very ingenious mechanic,” and mentions as the cause of
his death a severe cold caught while engaged in the erection of some
machinery. Deprived of this parent before he was eight years old, it was
fortunate for him that his mother was a woman of ability, of gentle and
charitable disposition, and attentive to the education of her children.
An expressive pencil sketch and a characteristic description, both from
memory, record his devotion to his mother.
According to his own account, however, not only were the means of his
instruction at the village school very limited, but they were in some
degree interfered with by his own wandering and musing habits. The
rural games in those “merrie daies” of England might sometimes attract
the wayward and comparatively unrestrained scholar from his books; but
he was more frequently learning of another mistress, and forming, for
after-life, a habit of close and curious contemplation of nature.
After his father’s death and his mother’s second marriage, the person to
whom he was principally to look up to for protection, was his father’s
eldest brother, to a portion of whose property he was heir. From this
kinsman, who was but little pleased with his nephew’s love of collecting
the “pundibs”[2] and “poundstones,” or “quoitstones,”[3] and had no
sympathies with his fancies of carving sun-dials on the soft brown
“oven-stone”[4] of the neighbourhood, he with great difficulty wrung, by
repeated entreaty, money for the purchase of a few books fit to instruct
a boy in the rudiments of geometry and surveying. But the practical
farmer was better satisfied when the youth manifested an intelligent
interest in the processes of draining and improving land; and there is no
doubt that young William profited in after-life by the experience, if it
may be so called, which he gathered in his boyhood while accompanying his
relative (“old William”) over his lands at Over Norton.
Whatever he saw, was remembered for ever. To the latest hours of life
he retained a clear and complete recollection of almost every event of
his boyhood and often interested young and old by his vivid pictures
of what he had seen when a child. These notices would be swelled to an
unreasonable degree by introducing the pleasant stories of “the narrative
old man;” but the following recollections, written in his seventieth
year, of events which had passed fifty-six years before, are worth
preserving as evidence of this peculiar circumstantiality of memory.
“I was early a tall and strong-grown boy, and in my way to London,
between twelve and thirteen years of age, I particularly noticed the
great work of cutting down the chalk hill at Henley-upon-Thames, and how
the loaded carriages on an inclined plane were made to bring up the empty
ones.
“I was in London shortly after the riots of Lord George Gordon; and at
the time when news of Rodney’s defeat of the French fleet arrived.
“There was then a halfpenny toll for foot-persons passing over
Blackfriars Bridge; the Albion Mills (worked by steam power) had just
before been burnt down.
“Criminals were hanged at Tyburn, where there were cow-houses with wood
seats on top for persons to see the executions.
“From Manchester Square to the Edgeware Road and Paddington, there were
footpaths entirely across open fields. The buildings on the side of the
square were unfinished; but, as more connected with what relates to the
earth, I saw how the ground was made in Manchester Square, for a poor
fellow, in turning his cartload of slush, had let his horse and cart slip
down, so that he was up to his middle in mud, endeavouring to extricate
his horse just as I passed by. This was on the east side of the square.”
In 1783, and from this time to 1787, the young man, without instruction
or sympathy, prosecuted irregularly, but with ardour and success, the
studies to which his mind was awakened. He began to draw, attempted
to colour, became tolerably versed in the geometry and calculations
then thought sufficient for engineers and surveyors, and by these
acquirements, at the age of eighteen, so strongly recommended himself
to Mr. Edward Webb, of Stow-on-the-Wold, who had been invited to make a
complete survey of the parish of Churchill, for the purpose of enclosure,
that he became assistant to that most able and excellent man, and was
taken into his family.
This was the critical moment; from this event flowed all the current
of his useful life, and to the same origin may be ascribed many of the
peculiar habits and feelings, the contrasted lights and shades, which
diversified his character.
Edward Webb was, like his pupil, self-taught, and very slightly
acquainted with languages and general literature, but possessed of great
ingenuity and skill in mechanics, mensuration, logarithms, algebra and
fluxions. His practice as a surveyor included many things now conceded
to the engineer, such as the determination of the forces of water, and
planning machinery. His instruments were commonly invented, often made
and divided by himself; peculiar pentagraphs, theodolites, scales, and
even compasses and field books, of new construction enriched the office
at Stow, and stimulated the young men who were fortunate enough to be
placed in it, to thought and exertion. “I admired,” says the subject of
this memoir, “the talent of my master, his placid and ever unruffled
temper, and his willingness to let me get on, for I required no teaching.”
Speedily entrusted with the management of all the ordinary business of
a surveyor, Mr. Smith traversed, in continual activity, the oolitic
lands of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire, the lias clays and red marls
of Warwickshire; visited (1788) the Salperton tunnel on the Thames
and Severn Canal, and (1790) examined the soils and circumstances
connected with a boring for coal in the New Forest, opposite the Shoe
alehouse at Plaitford. All the varieties of soil, in so many surveys in
different districts, were particularly noticed, and compared with the
general aspect and character of the country, and the agricultural and
commercial appropriations. The arrangement of the lias limestone beds in
Warwickshire contrasted with the neighbouring red marls at Inkborough,
the boring for coal in some dark lias clays on the road to Warwick, the
absence of arenaceous beds from the limestones of Churchill—these were
some of the points treasured in a mind capable of combining them at a
future time.
In 1793 we find him engaged in executing surveys and complete systems
of levelling, for the line of a proposed canal. In the course of the
operations which he performed in the summer and autumn, a speculation
which had come into his mind regarding a general law affecting the strata
of the district, was submitted to proof and confirmed. He had _supposed_
that the strata lying above the coal were not laid horizontally, but
inclined; that they were all inclined in one direction, viz., the
eastward, so as to successively terminate at the surface, and thus to
“resemble, on a large scale, the ordinary appearance of superposed slices
of bread and butter.” This supposition was now proved to be correct by
the levelling processes executed in two parallel valleys, for in each of
the levelled lines the strata of “red ground,” “lias,” and “freestone”
(afterwards called “oolite”), came down in an eastern direction and sunk
below the level, and yielded place to the next in succession.
But at the same time it was known to Mr. Smith that the position of
the strata of coal in Somersetshire was not generally conformed to
that of the “red earth” “lias,” and other beds above; the same thing
was proved to him by an inspection of the colliery at Bucklechurch, in
Gloucestershire; he knew besides that the great faults which divide _all_
the coal strata underground, were in general found not to divide _any_ of
the superincumbent rocks which formed the surface.
Geologists who, at the present time, notwithstanding the devoted
attention which has been paid to the phenomena of local displacement,
find a difficulty in understanding the causes, may imagine the perplexity
in the mind of a _discoverer_. Mr. Smith felt this perplexity severely,
but not long. The Canal Bill, on which he was engaged, received the
sanction of Parliament in 1794; and one of the first steps taken by the
judicious committee of management was to depute two members of their
body to accompany Mr. Smith, “their engineer,” on a tour of inquiry and
observation regarding the construction, management, and trade of other
navigations in England and Wales.
The tour extended altogether nine hundred miles, and occupied between
one and two months; by one route the party reached Newcastle, and by
another returned, through Shropshire and Wales to Bath. Mr. Palmer and
Mr. Perkins were gentlemen well acquainted with coal-working, and
they willingly stayed to inspect every new invention applied to canals
and collieries; but Mr. Smith’s treasured object of consideration on
the road, that which occupied all his thoughts in the intervals of
professional inquiries, was the aspect and structure of the country
passed through, in order to determine if his preconceived generalizations
of a settled order of succession, continuity of range at the surface, and
general declination eastward, were true on a large scale.
It is needless now to say that his general views were justified; he
found the strata from the vicinity of Bath and Bristol prolonged into
the north of England, in the same general order of succession with the
general eastward dip. There is, however, one part of the conclusions
adopted in this rapid survey from a postchaise, which merits particular
attention. He passed through York on the high road to Newcastle, and saw
at a distance of from five to fifteen miles to the east the hills of
chalk and oolite. He was satisfied of their nature by their _contours_
and _relative position_, and by their position on the surface in relation
to the lias and “red ground” occasionally seen on the road. This is, in
fact, the only authority he could rely upon for drawing, in 1800, the
continuations of the chalk of Wiltshire, and the oolite of Somersetshire,
through the eastern parts of Yorkshire, but he drew them with a
considerable approximation to accuracy.
Engaged for six years in setting out and superintending the works on the
Somersetshire Coal Canal, Mr. Smith found but few opportunities of making
known to scientific persons, the peculiar generalizations which had
taken possession of his mind. But in the execution of these works he was
putting his thoughts into practice, informing the contractors what would
be the nature of the ground to be cut through, what parts of the canal
would require unusual care to be kept water-tight, what was the most
advantageous system of work. Another singular advantage attended this
engagement. The notions which up to this time he had obtained regarding
the distribution of organic remains were comparatively vague. He found
peculiar plants in the “clift” above the coal, particular shells in the
lias and oolites, but none in the red ground, and he had combined these
simple facts so far as to see that “each stratum had been successively
the bed of the sea, and contained in it the mineralized monuments of the
races of organic beings then in existence.” But it was the necessity of
possessing an accurate knowledge of the different sorts of rock, sand,
and clay, which were to be cut through on the line of the canal, which
led him to examine minutely and scrupulously into the distribution of the
“fossils” which he had been in the habit of collecting. The result was a
proposition which he proved to be locally true, and of practical value,
and which has now a world-wide application, “that each stratum contained
organized fossils peculiar to itself, and might, in cases otherwise
doubtful, be recognized and discriminated from others like it, but in a
different part of the series, by examination of them.” In other words,
he discovered that strata are to be recognized by their fossils. He now
remarked also the contrast between the rounded state and mixed condition
of the fossils which lay in gravel deposits and the sharply preserved
specimens lying in natural associations in the strata, and thus acquired
a notion of the distinction between what were afterwards named diluvial
and stratified deposits.
The possessor of all these generalizations, now (1795) twenty-six years
of age, was still shrouded in the obscure village of High Littleton, but
in this year he removed to Bath, and took up his abode in the central
house of a short range of buildings called the Cottage Crescent, which
occupied a picturesque and elevated site south of that city. “From this
point,” says he, “the eye roved anxiously over the interesting expanse
which extended before me to the Sugar-loaf mountain in Monmouthshire, and
embraced all in the vicinities of Bath and Bristol. Then did a thousand
thoughts occur to me, respecting the geology of that and adjacent
districts continually under my eye, which have never been reduced to
writing.” He continued to direct all the operations on the Somerset Coal
Canal, and very copious note-books attest the constancy and exactitude of
his attention to that occupation. To this cause, indeed, may be ascribed
the extreme rarity of any essays, or even memoranda, from which the
progress of his geological studies can be gathered.
That in January, 1796, he had begun to commit his thoughts to paper, in
a lucid arrangement for publication, the written proofs remain. In 1797
he drew a larger general plan for such a work; but not till 1799, after
his engagement ceased with the Coal Canal Company, did he make public his
intention to compose a general work on the stratification of Britain, or
enter on the prosecution of an actual survey of the geological structure
of the whole of England and Wales.
In the execution of the canal, Mr. Smith had found the means of applying
his newly acquired knowledge to useful practical problems, such as how
to draw the line through a country full of porous rocks, so as best to
retain the limited supplies of water which frequent mills left to the
navigation, where to place bridges on a good foundation, how to intercept
and conduct the springs, and where to open quarries of proper stone. We
find him also engaged, as early as 1796, in the short intervals which
could be snatched from the main business before him, in putting to
practical proof his theoretical views of the earth’s structure and the
properties of the mixed calcareous and argillaceous strata in the hills
near Bath, by a new and successful process of land-draining.
The earliest connected remarks which have been found, bear the date of
January, 1796, and relate to organic remains and their distribution in
the different strata. The vicinity of Bath is rich in fossils, and fine
collections were formed there previous to Mr. Smith’s researches. It
might be after inspecting some of these treasures, whose full value was
so entirely unknown to their owners, that the following reflections,
which strikingly illustrate the enlarged state of his own views at that
period, were penned:—
“Dunkerton, Swan, Jan. 5, 1796.
“Fossils have been long studied as great curiosities,
collected with great pains, treasured with great and at a
great expense, and shown and admired with as much pleasure
as a child’s hobby-horse is shown and admired by himself and
his playfellows, because it is pretty; and this has been done
by _thousands who have never paid the least regard to that
wonderful order and regularity with which nature has disposed
of these singular productions, and assigned to each class its
peculiar stratum_.”
Gifted in a very uncommon degree with that philosophical faith in the
generality and harmony of natural laws which is a characteristic of
discoveries in natural science, Mr. Smith was at the same time remarkably
disinclined to indulge in himself, or even to tolerate in others, mere
speculations in geology. Whatever of this nature he found in the circle
of his reading, was severely judged by a close collocation of the
hypothesis which had been advanced with the phenomena of stratification
which he had entirely established. These judgments might be erroneous
in cases which required the knowledge of other data, not then collected,
for a true and general solution; but the very unreasonableness of raising
the standard of his own discoveries in a limited region, for condemning
a speculation perhaps founded on other truths occurring elsewhere, shows
how firmly these discoveries, and the influences belonging to them, were
established and fortified in his mind. The following passage, written in
January, 1796, might have been acknowledged by the author to contain his
real opinions forty years later:—
“Therefore every man of prudence and observation who has paid the
strictest attention to mineralogy, the structure of the earth, and the
changes it has undergone, will be very cautious how he sets about to
invent a system which nature cannot conform to without having recourse
to subterraneous fires, volcanic eruptions, or uncommon convulsions, by
which every hill and dale must have been formed and every rock must have
been rent to form those chasms, which, in comparison to the strata they
are found in, are no more than sun-cracks in a clod of clay; yet such has
been the language of ingenious men, who have set their theoretical worlds
a-going without either tooth or pinion of nature’s mechanism belonging to
them.”
In October and November of this year (1796), we find him returning to the
contemplation of organic remains; discussing the circumstances which
attend the sparry substance occupying the place of the shell, which has
been removed, in the lias, and the empty cavity, where the shell was,
surrounding a loose stony cast of the interior, in the freestone (oolite).
That his mind was now actively employed in tracing out the bearings of
the extensive subject before him, will be evident from the following
extract, dated August, 1797:—
“_Locality of plants, insects, birds, etc., arises from the
nature of the strata._
“Where art has not diverted the order of things and nature is
left to herself, a considerable locality may be observed in
many animals and vegetables as well as mineral productions, by
which they evidently attached to particular soils to such a
degree that, if this subject were studied with attention, it
would form one of the principal external characteristics of the
strata underneath. Though it may seem mysterious to some, that
birds, beasts, insects, etc., which have the liberty of roving
at pleasure, should feel any particular attachment for this or
that soil, yet the wonder ceases when we consider how the chain
of natural things is linked together, and how these creatures
are taught to cull their food from insects that are lodged in,
or seeds that are produced from, particular plants that grow
upon particular soils.”
Smith had seen layers of limestone crowded with shells succeeded by
others containing corals. He found ammonites and oysters in some, and
insect remains in others, and his speculations assumed the curious phase
of the sentences just noticed. But he soon became aware that accident had
much to do with the presence of certain organic remains in strata, and
that, whilst some fossils, like corals, once lived where they are now
preserved in strata, others were carried there as the deposit collected.
A manuscript, dated December 2, 1796, Dunkerton, Swan Inn, headed “Strata
in general, and their position,” and evidently intended for publication,
commences thus:—
“The strata being found as regular on one side of a rivulet, river, deep
valley or channel as on the other, over an extent of many miles, when
proper allowance is made for the inclination, and for the variation of
the surface, is it not reasonable to suppose that the same strata may be
found as regular on one side of the sea or ocean as on opposite sides of
a deep valley upon land, and if so, and the continuation of the strata
is general, what is their general direction or drift? Is it in straight
lines from pole to pole, or in curved lines surrounding the globe
regularly inclined to the east?”
After hinting at a general cause for such an assumed regularity, he adds,
“But all theories are best built on practical rules, which will enable
any one to make such observations for himself as must carry conviction
along with them; for a work so novel as this must expect to find some
who will hardly believe what is plain to be seen; for all men do not
see alike, nor can patiently trudge through the dirt to search for truth
among the stubborn rocks where nature has best displayed her.... Shall,
therefore, describe a number of quarries, cliffs, etc., at a great
distance, etc. See Book——”
In what seems to be the continuation of this paper, we see the
predominant desire of the author to establish the certainty and
generality of the inclination of strata, which he had proved on a limited
scale near Bath.
“If the strata lay horizontal, every part of the sea-shore would present
the same beds at the water edge instead of that wonderful variety
which is found on the coast and banks of every river and rivulet in
the kingdom, especially those that run in an east and west direction,
or nearly so. In such situations the young mineralogist may soon be
convinced of that wonderful regularity which nature has adopted,
especially if the shores are rocky; he will there find that, independent
of partial and local dips which appear in different quarries of the same
stone, the outlines, or top and bottom layers of each complete stratum or
class of stones or earth, considered as a mass, have a general tendency
towards the eastern horizon.”
By the term “dip” is meant the inclination that strata make with the
horizon. Mr. W. Smith constantly brought forward his well worked out fact
that the strata of England dip from west to east more or less. The oldest
strata come to the surface in Wales and the lake districts, and because
they were upheaved the newer strata were tilted and curved, and the slope
is to the east.
In February, 1798, we find as part of the introduction to this
contemplated work, an interesting notice of some of the steps by which
the author was conducted to his general conclusions.
“It will be readily admitted by all classes of men, from the most
accurate observers of nature to the simplest peasant, that there is some
degree of regularity in the strata from whence our building materials
are generally collected. Masons, miners, and quarrymen can identify
particular beds of stone dug many miles apart; indeed, every cliff and
quarry presents a true section of a great many beds of stone, which may
be found of the same quality and in the same position in all or most of
the neighbouring cliffs and quarries. And this regularity is nowhere more
conspicuous than in the lias quarries of Somersetshire, from whence these
observations first took their rise, about seven years since.
“For the stratification of stone struck me, who had not been accustomed
to such appearances, as something very uncommon, and till I had learned
the technical terms of the strata, and made a subterraneous journey or
two, I could not conceive a clear idea of what seemed so familiar to the
colliers; but when these difficulties were surmounted, and an intelligent
bailiff accompanied me, I was much pleased with my peregrinations below,
and soon learnt enough of the order of the strata to describe on a plan
the manner of working the coal in the lands I was then surveying.
“Being engaged soon after to survey the lands and take the levels of
a canal that was proposed to be made from the collieries to Bath, I
observed a variation of the strata on the same line of level, and soon
found that the lias rock, which about three miles back was full three
hundred feet above this line, was now thirty feet below it, and became
the bed of the river, and in that direction did not appear any more at
the surface. This induced me to note the inclination of the same rock,
which I knew was to be found at the head of two other valleys lying each
about a mile distant from, and in a parallel direction to, the one just
described, and accordingly found it to dip the same to the south-east,
and sink under the rivers in a similar manner.
“From this I began to consider that other strata might also have some
general inclination as well as this (though I had been frequently
told by the colliers that there was no regularity in the strata above
ground), yet, by tracing them through the country some miles, I found the
inclination of every bed to be nearly the same as [that of] the lias;
and notwithstanding the partial and local dips of many quarries which
varied from this rule, I was thoroughly satisfied by these observations
that everything had a general tendency to the south-east, and thence
concluded there could be none of these beds to the north-west, the truth
of which conjecture was soon verified by a tour of observation through
the northern parts of this kingdom.”
In March, 1798, Mr. Smith purchased a small but beautiful estate, in
a deep valley, within three miles of Bath, almost overgrown with wild
wood, hiding in its bosom a sheet of water and a small mill. Through
this retired possession the canal was cut, without greatly injuring its
remarkable beauty; and, under Mr. Smith’s fond and tasteful attention the
scene was partly cleared, the pond expanded to a lake, the cottage became
a comfortable home, in which he passed many happy and thoughtful hours.
He did not, however, at any time reside long in this favourite retreat,
but took up his station for about a year at the village of Mitford, near
Bath, and engaged in the last duties which he performed as resident
engineer to the Coal Canal.
Owing to a misunderstanding with the Company, this occupation ceased
in June, 1799, and Mr. Smith felt and acknowledged that a new era in
his life had arrived. He was not only at liberty, but placed under the
necessity to consider the best means of making known his geological
system, and of founding upon it a professional practice, which might
provide the expense of travelling to verify and extend his knowledge, and
fill up the outline of a geological map of England and Wales.
In these objects, which were ever closely associated in his own mind,
he was successful; the most valuable portions of his discoveries soon
became public property, and he quickly acquired extensive employment in
the practical applications of these discoveries to mineral surveying
and draining of land on a large scale. The extensive diffusion of
his fame and opinions, which now began, was owing to no actual and
authorized publication, but to continual discussions and explorations
with several active friends, oral communications and exhibitions of maps
at agricultural meetings (then frequent), and circulation of manuscript
copies of tabular expositions of the series of strata at that time
determined.
His views at this epoch appear by the following notice:—
“During my five years’ close confinement to practical engineering on the
Coal Canal, my much-wished-for opportunity of collecting observations
enough from the ranges of the different strata to make an accurate
delineation of the stratification throughout England were suspended.
“I had seen enough by my tour of August, 1794, to satisfy myself of the
practicability of doing it, and often wasted much time in poring over
maps, in contriving how the ranging edges and planes of different strata
could best be rendered intelligible: models were thought of, and one
small map was cut along the edges of some of the strata with a view of
defining their extent, and of showing how one stratum was successively
covered by another.
“I drew in colours, on a map of the vicinity of Bath, and on ‘Day and
Masters’ county survey,’ all [that had been observed] very accurately to
a certain extent, which embraced an interesting but intricate variety of
strata in hills around Bath; and some small maps of England were spoiled
by speculating on the ranges of stratification without sufficient data.
The intricacies in their marginal edges were such that I found, to mark
point by point, as the facts were ascertained, was the only way in which
I could safely proceed.
“My experience in what I had done upon the Somersetshire map was
sufficient to convince me that to make a map of the strata on a scale
as large as Cary’s England (five miles to an inch), with sufficient
accuracy, much of it should first be drawn on a larger scale.”
It was fortunate for Mr. Smith, and for the progress of his views, that
he gained at this time the friendship of a man singularly competent to
estimate the truth and value of these views, and both able and willing
to advocate the merit of their author. The Rev. Benjamin Richardson was
at this time living in Bath, and possessed a choice collection of local
fossils, mostly gathered by his own diligent hands. Extensively versed
in natural history, and generally well acquainted with the progress of
science, he was perfectly enthusiastic in following out, and liberal in
enabling others to prosecute, new and ingenious researches, especially
if they tended to practical and public good. He knew accurately the
country in which Mr. Smith had principally worked, and was acquainted
with the views entertained on the subject of fossils, which had been
recorded in books, or were adopted by the collectors, who were even then
celebrated in the vicinity of Bath. He had no knowledge of the laws of
stratification and the connection between the forms of organic life and
the order of superposition of the strata; while, on the other hand, his
new friend had very little knowledge of the true nature of these organic
forms, and their exact relation to analogous living types. The result of
a meeting between two such reciprocally adjusted minds was an electric
combination; the fossils which the one possessed were marshalled in the
order of strata by the other, until they all found their appropriate
places, and the arrangement of the cabinet became a true copy of nature.
That such fossils had been found, in such rocks, was immediately
acknowledged by Mr. Richardson to be true, though the connection had
not before presented itself to his mind; but when Mr. Smith added the
assurance, that everywhere throughout this district, and to considerable
distances around, it was a general law that the “_same strata were found
always in the same order of superposition and contained the same peculiar
fossils_,” his friend was both astonished and incredulous. He immediately
acceded to Mr. Smith’s proposal for undertaking some field examinations
to determine the truth of these assertions, and having interested in the
object a new and learned associate, the Rev. Joseph Townsend (author
of “Travels in Spain”), they at once executed the project. Among other
places visited with this view was the detached hill on which Dundry
Church is conspicuously elevated. From its form and position in respect
of the lias of Keynsham, Mr. Smith had inferred that this hill was capped
by the lowest of the Bath “freestones” (inferior oolite); and, from his
general views, he expected to find in that rock the fossils which the
freestones contained near Bath; that is to say, on the westward rise,
which he believed to affect all the strata near Bath above the coal. It
is needless now to say, that examination confirmed both the inference of
the character of the rock and the conformity of its organic contents.
The effect of this and other illustrations of the reality of Mr. Smith’s
speculations was decisive. In general literature, and especially in
natural history, Mr. Smith was immeasurably surpassed by his friends,
but they acknowledged that, from his labours in a different quarter, a
new light had begun to manifest itself in the previously dark horizon of
geology, and they set themselves earnestly to make way for its auspicious
influence.
What a step was made from the old ideas that fossils were sports of
nature to the proof that during the long ages of the earth’s history
every deposit of river mud, sea-shore sand, and marine collection
contained relics of its age of accumulation; and that there has been a
succession of animals and plants on the earth foreshadowing those that
now exist.
One day, after dining together at the house of the Rev. Joseph Townsend,
it was proposed by one of this triumvirate, that a tabular view of the
main features of the subject, as it had been expounded by Mr. Smith,
and verified and enriched by their joint labours, should be drawn up
in writing. Richardson held the pen, and wrote down, from Smith’s
dictation, the different strata according to their order of succession in
descending order, commencing with the chalk, and numbered, in continuous
series, down to the coal, below which the strata were not sufficiently
determined, according to the scheme already noticed.
To this description of the strata was added, in the proper places, a list
of the most remarkable fossils which had been gathered in the several
layers of rock. The names of these fossils were principally supplied
by Mr. Richardson, and are such as were then, and for a long time
afterwards, familiarly employed in the many collections near Bath. Of the
document thus jointly arranged each person present took a copy, under no
stipulation as to the use which should be made of it, and accordingly it
was extensively distributed, and remained for a long period the type and
authority for the descriptions and order of superposition of the strata
near Bath.
Years rolled on, and Smith’s wanderings over England and their results
were laid down by him on a map, which was to be published. With regard
to this map of the strata, it may be said that it was very trying work
for the publisher as well as the author. The basis of the map, as
already explained, was in many respects peculiar; the colouring of it
was more so. Instead of the _flat colouring_ ending in narrow defined
edges usually employed for maps, Mr. Smith introduced a peculiar style
of _full tints_ for the edges of the strata, _softened_ into the paler
tint employed for the remainder of the area which they occupied on the
surface. This new style of colouring gave a picturesque effect to the
map, but required more than usual skill and patience to be correctly
executed, and occasioned great trouble in examining the copies. The
colouring of the map was thus rendered more expensive than had been
anticipated, and notwithstanding the labour was well paid for, it was not
always at first properly performed.
At length the difficulties inseparable from such a task were so far
overcome, and this enormous labour was so far completed, that a coloured
map of the strata of England and Wales was submitted to the consideration
of the Society of Arts, supported by various testimonials of its general
accuracy and value, in April and May, 1815. The result was the award of
the premium of £50, which had been in vain offered for very many years
for a work of this description—a reward which Mr. Smith might have
claimed long ago, had not an honest desire to produce his work complete
withheld the attempt. The map was published on the 1st of August, 1815,
dedicated to Sir Joseph Banks, and from that hour the fame of its author
as a great original discoverer in English geology was secured. Would
that this epoch of his revived and enlarged reputation had also been the
dawn of more prosperous fortunes, or that, satisfied with the degree
in which he had accomplished his gigantic task, he had left to others
the completion of his work, and devoted himself for a time to even the
humblest of those professional labours by which he had been at least
supported through oppressive difficulties, and by which he must have
already grown comparatively rich but for the incessant drain of money in
following up discoveries which no living man could reasonably hope to
complete.
Science, indeed, is a mistress whose golden smiles are not often lavished
on poor and enthusiastic suitors. The time for a strenuous exertion was
indeed come. Geology had kept him poor by consuming all his professional
gains; the neglect of his employers too often left these unpaid; in
such a condition one unfortunate step was ruin, and that step was
made. On the property which he had purchased near Bath, and which he
had greatly improved, he was tempted to lay a railway for bringing the
freestone of Comb down to the Coal Canal, to open new quarries of this
stone, and to establish new machinery for cutting and shaping it for
buildings. The project, which looked well at first, failed utterly by
the unexpected deficiency of the stone, on whose good quality the whole
success depended. The abandonment of this cherished scheme was followed
by the compulsory sale of the still more cherished property, a load of
debt remained to be discharged, and the miserable effects fell heavily on
others besides himself. But there were not wanting persons of station,
knowledge, and humanity, who, esteeming Mr. Smith and admiring his
solitary and ceaseless industry, exerted themselves to save him from the
sad fate which seemed to await him.
Such things are common in the lives of men, but they are not often
encountered by so resolved and patient a spirit as that of Mr. Smith. One
who saw the struggle may boldly say this, because there can be no other
motive for mentioning private and personal griefs but to show forth the
character of the mind which could firmly bear and overcome them. As a
mean of reducing his difficulties he proposed to sell that geological
collection which had been so much prized, and through the assistance of
some friends a communication was opened with the Treasury. Two gentlemen
being deputed to examine the collection, reported favourably, and their
lordships were pleased to authorize the purchase, in order that the
specimens might be fitted up in the British Museum. There was also some
defined notion of engaging Mr. Smith’s services at the museum to take
charge of and explain the geological principles which this collection
was intended to illustrate; but this project came to nothing.
In the winter of 1818-19, Mr. Smith revisited, after an absence of ten
years, his native village, re-examined the unforgotten localities where
in childhood his “pundibs” and “poundstones” were gathered, and collected
“marlstone” fossils from an excavation at Churchill Mill, nearly at the
same points where he had noticed them in 1787. In one whose life had been
one long wandering, and who had earned for himself an immortal name,
this return to the haunts of his childhood and the simplicity of village
occupations, must have excited many interesting reflections. He had sold
his patrimony, and what had been the modest dwelling of his ancestors
for two hundred years; he had disbursed in travelling for what he deemed
a public object all that he had earned; while one of his two brothers,
quietly prosecuting trade in his native village, had grown a rich and
prosperous man.
In the autumn of 1819 Mr. Smith gave up his house in London, after
fifteen years’ occupation, and was compelled to submit to the sale of
his furniture, collections, and books, preserving in fact, only his
papers, maps, sections and other drawings, through the kindness of a most
faithful friend. While this happened, he was in Yorkshire busily engaged,
apparently oblivious, perhaps sternly regardless, of what seemed to
others an insupportable misfortune. He deemed it an inevitable corollary
to his irretrievable losses in the unlucky speculation already mentioned
near Bath, and armed himself with what seemed more than fortitude to meet
it.
One more used to monetary arrangements would have foreseen and averted
this occurrence; but on the practical geologist the blow fell with
stunning effect. He surrendered with deep regret his interest in the
much-loved and really valuable little property near Bath, quitted London,
and consented to have no home. From this time for seven years he became
a wanderer in the north of England, rarely visiting London, except when
drawn thither by the professional engagements which still, even in
his loneliest retirements, were pressed upon him, and yielded him an
irregular, contracted, and fluctuating income.
In the winter of 1819-20, Mr. Smith, having perhaps more than usual
leisure, undertook to walk from Lincolnshire into Oxfordshire. The object
proposed was to pass along a particular line through the counties of
Rutland, Northampton, Bedford, and Oxford, but the ultimate destination
was Swindon, in Wiltshire.
“Leaving the great road at Colsterworth, with some reflections on the
birthplace of Newton,[5] we crossed in a day’s easy walk, the little
county of Rutland, its hills of oolite and sand, its slopes of upper
lias, and its valleys often showing marlstone, and reached the obscure
village of Gretton, on the edge of Rockingham Forest. Whatever may now
be the accommodations at this village, they were very wretched in 1819
(December), but the odd stories of supernatural beings and incredible
frights which were narrated by the villagers assembled at the little inn,
greatly amused Mr. Smith, and reminded him of exactly parallel tales
which circulated around Whichwood Forest in his boyhood.
“The next morning we walked to Kettering, noticing on the road the
peculiar characters of the Northamptonshire oolite. In this walk Mr.
Smith had somehow sprained or over-fatigued himself, and he chose to
proceed to Wellingborough in a chaise. From this point, situated on sand
of the oolite series, we resumed our geological proceedings on foot,
and passing by Irchester, Woolaston, and Boziate, traversed in the next
hills the oolite, the forest marble, the cornbrash, and an outlier of
Kelloway’s rock. The road up Boziate Hill was mantled with fossiliferous
stone, some of which, obtained from the hill-top, was believed to be
Kelloway’s rock, and was found to contain _Ammonites sublævis_ and other
fossils. A fine specimen of this ammonite was here laid by a particular
tree on the road side, as it was large and inconvenient for the pocket,
according to a custom often observed by Mr. Smith, whose memory for
localities was so exact, that he has often, after many years, gone direct
to some hoard of this nature, to recover his fossils. This road, however,
over Boziate Hill, he was not to travel again.
“From Olney to Buckingham the route was performed in chaise. The stone
dug here in clay attracted much attention, and Mr. Smith doubted whether
to rank it as forest marble or cornbrash. We now crossed the oolitic
country to Aynhoe, celebrated for its fossils, on foot; next day
continued the walk to Deddington, Chapelhouse, and Churchill, and after
a few days walked to Burford, and then travelled in the ordinary way
to Swindon, Oxford, and London. In passing through Oxford, Mr. Smith,
for the first time in his life, had the pleasure of seeing Professor
Buckland, at the house of Mr. Bliss, the bookseller, with whom he walked
over Shotover Hill, on his way toward London.”
This little tour is thus briefly narrated, because it appears in all
respects a fair example of the usual way in which Mr. Smith explored
the country, walking when the object he had in view required this mode
of examination, travelling as fast as possible in all other cases, but
always recording in note-books or on maps, the observations he made.
Up in the north of England on the east coast Smith loved to wander
beneath the cliffs, noting the minutest variations in the stratification,
detecting the slightest marks of dislocation, watching the peculiarities
of the sea’s action on materials of unlike qualities, and inferring the
causes which had anciently modified the outline of the land, and covered
the low cliffs of the oolitic series with fragments of the lias from
Whitby, of the coal and limestone from Teesdale or Swaledale, and of the
granite and syenite from the Shap Fells and Carrock Pike. In numerous
papers dedicated to the local geology of Scarborough, his reflections
on these subjects are recorded; his exertions in examining one curious
case of dislocation on the north side of the Castle Hill, brought on
rheumatic, or rather a paralytic affection of the muscles of the lower
extremities, which bound him a prisoner in bed in the early part of 1825.
Previous to this accident, he had taken part in a course of lectures to
the Literary and Philosophical Society of Hull; after it had occurred,
and before its effects were removed, while yet he was incapable of
walking, and was actually lifted into the carriage which took him away,
he accepted and executed a similar engagement proposed by the Literary
and Philosophical Society of Sheffield. It was a singular spectacle,
to witness the delivery of lectures which required continual reference
to large maps and numerous diagrams, by a man who could not stand, but
was forced to read his address from a chair, to an audience of several
hundred persons in a room not very well adapted for the voice. But it
was far more extraordinary to witness during all the severity of the
disorder, the unpretending patience and fortitude of the sufferer, who,
had he then permitted his mind to dwell too curiously on the state of
his health and the state of his finances, might have added the bitter
foretaste of want and privation to the actual difficulty of the moment.
Such reflections and such anticipations might sadden the hearts of those
who surrounded him, but Mr. Smith would have thought it unworthy of his
resolved mind and firm trust in Providence, to have abated one jot of his
accustomed cheerfulness, shortened one of the innumerable playful stories
which were always springing to his lips from the rich treasure-house of
his memory, or turned his meditations from his favourite subjects.
At Sheffield, while slowly recovering the use of his limbs, he busied
himself in arranging a body of information which he had gathered
concerning the neighbouring coal districts; and on removing soon
afterwards to his old quarters at Doncaster, he worked much on the large
“Old Survey of Yorkshire,” thinking to complete the colouring of it. By
degrees he recovered entirely from his painful disorder, and from this
year (1825) to 1839, nothing of the kind ever affected him again.
But these years were fruitful of events interesting to the friends of
William Smith. In February, 1831, the Council of the Geological Society
of London honoured him by awarding to him the first Wollaston medal; and
the terms with which the gift was accompanied render this act on the part
of the society and the president extremely memorable. Dr. Wollaston’s
services to physical science were well known and duly honoured in his
lifetime; geology has felt, and will long feel the benefit of his dying
bequest. He invested one thousand pounds in the three per cent. Reduced
Bank Annuities, in the joint names of himself and the Geological Society,
and directed that after his decease, “the society should apply the
dividends in promoting researches concerning the mineral structure of the
earth, or in rewarding those by whom such researches should hereafter
be made; or in such manner as should appear to the Council of the said
society for the time being, conducive to the interests of the society
in particular, or the science of geology in general.” He afterwards
enjoined the society “not to hoard the dividends parsimoniously, but to
expend them liberally, and, as far as might be, annually, in furthering
the objects of the trust.” The first year’s income from this fund was
appropriated to the acquisition of a die for a medal bearing the head of
Dr. Wollaston, and this having been undertaken by Mr. Wyon, the society
was prepared in 1831 to fulfil the trust with which they were charged.
The council accordingly passed unanimously the following resolutions,
Jan. 11, 1831:—
“1. That a medal of fine gold, bearing the impress of the head of Dr.
Wollaston, and not exceeding the value of ten guineas, be procured with
the least possible delay.
“2. That the first Wollaston medal be given to Mr. William Smith, in
consideration of his being a great original discoverer in English
geology; and especially for his having been the first, in this country,
to discover and to teach the identification of strata, and to determine
their succession by means of their imbedded fossils.”
The announcement of this award was made by a congenial spirit. The chair
of the Geological Society was then filled by one of its most honoured
members, an original thinker and faithful observer, well qualified
to appreciate the originality of Mr. Smith’s discoveries, and well
acquainted by actual research with their extent and their value. In his
address on this occasion, Professor Sedgwick, speaking in the name of
the Geological Society, sketched a brief but satisfactory history of
Mr. Smith’s career, demonstrated the entire justice of the award of the
Council of the Geological Society, and added his personal testimony in
favour of Mr. Smith’s claims in terms of no ordinary value.
“I for one can speak with gratitude of the practical lessons I have
received from Mr. Smith. It was by tracking his footsteps, with his maps
in my hand, through Wiltshire and the neighbouring counties, where he had
trodden nearly thirty years before, that I first learned the subdivisions
of our oolitic series, and apprehended the meaning of those arbitrary and
somewhat uncouth terms, which we derive from him as our master, which
have long become engrafted into the conventional language of English
geologists, and through their influence have been, in part, also adopted
by the naturalists of the continent.
“After such a statement, gentlemen, I have a right to speak boldly, and
to demand your approbation of the council’s award. I could almost dare
to wish that stern lover of truth, to whose bounty we owe the “Donation
Fund,” that dark eye, before the glance of which all false pretensions
withered, were once more amongst us. And if it be denied us to hope that
a spirit like that of Wollaston should often be embodied on the earth, I
would appeal to those intelligent men who form the strength and ornament
of this society, whether there was any place for doubt or hesitation?
whether we were not compelled, by every motive which the judgment can
approve and the heart can sanction, to perform this act of filial duty,
before we thought of the claims of any other man, and to place our first
honour on the brow of the father of English geology?
“If, in the pride of our present strength, we were disposed to forget
our origin, our very speech bewrays us: for we use the language which he
taught us in the infancy of our science. If we, by our united efforts,
are chiselling the ornaments and slowly raising up the pinnacles of one
of the temples of nature, it was he who gave the plan, and laid the
foundations, and erected a portion of the solid walls by the unassisted
labour of his hands.
“The men who have led the way in useful discoveries, have ever held the
first place of honour in the estimation of all who in after times have
understood their works or trodden in their steps. It is upon this abiding
principle that we have acted; and in awarding our first prize to Mr.
Smith, we believe that we have done honour to our own body, and are
sanctioned by the highest feelings which bind societies together.
“I think it a high privilege to fill this chair on an occasion when we
met, not coldly to deliberate on the balance of conflicting claims, in
which, after all, we might go wrong, and give the prize to one man by
injustice to another; but to perform a sacred duty, where there is no
room for doubt or error, and to perform an act of public gratitude, in
which the judgment and the feelings are united.”[6]
On this occasion Mr. Smith presented to the society the original Table of
Stratification drawn in 1799, and a circle-map of the vicinity of Bath,
which had been geologically coloured about the same period.
The British Association, founded at York in 1831, held its second meeting
at Oxford in June, 1832; and on this occasion the Wollaston Medal,
awarded in the previous year, was put in Mr. Smith’s possession; and he
was further gratified by the announcement that a pension of one hundred
pounds, solicited by the united voice of English geologists, had been
assigned him by the Government of His Majesty William the Fourth.
The meeting of the British Association was this year (1839) appointed to
be held at Birmingham, on the 26th of August, and Mr. Smith received
from Mr. Joseph Hodgson (one of the secretaries of the meeting) a special
and very cordial invitation to be present. He stopped on his journey to
Birmingham, at the house of friends at Northampton. Here the kindest
welcome awaited him; and in addition to the pleasure of contemplating the
beautiful series of Northamptonshire fossils which had been collected, he
was gratified by several excursions into the neighbouring country, which
had always been interesting to him since, in earlier days, he had opened
the curious volume of Morton’s “Northamptonshire.” While thus tracing the
boundaries of the minor divisions of the oolitic rocks which he had been
the first to distinguish, a slight cold by which he was affected seemed
to the eyes of his friends, to deserve more attention than he bestowed on
it; medical assistance became immediately advisable. William Smith had
for many years been successful in guarding his own usually robust health,
and he was slow and reluctant to admit of advice better suited to the
disorder which now attacked him, and which on a former occasion had so
prostrated his strength that he recovered with difficulty. He began to
feel the attack serious, and to perceive the alarm in the faces of his
friends.
It was difficult to believe, that under that calm, thoughtful, and
pleased expression of countenance, those animated descriptions of the
country which he had visited a few days previously, those plans of
further and strenuous exertion, which asked years of active life for
completion, lurked pain and fatal disease. At first it seemed as if the
remedies applied were producing beneficial effects, but this hope failed;
the uncomplaining sufferer sank continually in each succeeding hour, till
his eyes lost their bright and kindly light and the ever-varying features
became fixed in serene and awful tranquility (Aug. 28, 1839).
His life, written by his distinguished relation the late Professor John
Phillips, F.R.S. of Oxford, has been the source of these pages. William
Smith’s portrait hangs in the most distinguished position, over the
president’s chair at the Geological Society of London. He was a great
genius, and suffered much toil and poverty, in order to produce the
truth; but he led a very happy life on the whole for his thoughts about
nature were his great and good riches. He proved that there is a regular
succession of strata which are characterized by their fossils, each
stratum being the burial ground of its time of collection.
[Illustration]