On the importance of the study of palaeontology
Authors: Davidson Thomas 
Published: December 2013

In a long letter to the Secretary, dated 7th December 1872, Mr Davidson advocated the appointment by the Society of a committee to prepare a list of the fossils discovered in the three Lothians and Fife. Commenting on the importance of palæontology to students of geology, Mr Davidson remarked:—‶I am fully aware that there are some few geologists who do not value as they should do the
immense importance
of palæontology to geology. What would become of geology if there were no palæontologists? For instance, my most esteemed friend, the late Professor Jukes, and several others I might name, continually undervalued the use of fossils in the determination of the age of sedimentary rocks; but the most amusing part of the matter is, that I possess a pile of letters from these geologists constantly inquiring from me the age of the fossils of those Irish and Devonshire beds they could not locate from geology alone! I have had hundreds of specimens sent me for examination by those gentlemen, and they did not fail to publish the result of my examination and lists in the explanation-sheets of their maps.

‶Professor Hébert, President of the Geological Society of France, a very distinguished French geologist, and an old friend of mine,
for years
used to say that he was a geologist, and paid but little attention to fossils; but since some years (as he informed me when in Brighton during the meeting of the British Association in August last) he has been
obliged
to become likewise a palæontologist, as he found that he could not disentangle the complicated Lower Cretaceous rocks and Upper Jurassic ones in the south of France and the Alps without the help of palæontology. Constantly am I applied to by some of the geologists on the survey of Great Britain with reference to difficult stratagraphical questions. They write, for instance, ‘We find these fossils only in the district we are surveying. Can you tell us the names of these species, and, from them, what might be the probable age of the rock we have before us?’ Innumerable instances could be given of the age of rocks, in distant regions or countries, being correctly made out solely by the examination,
at home,
of two or three fossils. I could give you many instances of this from my own personal experience. I will name two by way of example.

‶In 1853 my attention was called by Messrs Waterhouse and Woodward, of the British Museum, to a small collection of Chinese fossils, recently presented to the British Museum by a Mr W. Lockhart of Shanghai, and which had been purchased by him in a drug warehouse of that town. That was all the information I could obtain; but no sooner had I cast a glance at the specimens, than I perceived that they belonged to eight Devonian species, seven of which were common to several European localities, such as Ferques, Nehon, Chimay, and the Eifel, but not found all existing together in any one of these localities. They were all, however, Devonian types; and it was afterwards ascertained that rocks of that age occurred not very far distant from the shop where the fossils had been sold.

‶A few days ago, Professor Daubrée, a most distinguished French geologist, and a member of the Institute, sent for my examination a finely-preserved internal cast which that enterprising traveller the Abbé Armand David had found near Le Tchuan and Blue River, in China. This specimen belongs to the Museum of the Jardin des Plantes, Paris, and he asked me whether I could make out its species, and give him an idea as to the geological age of the rock from which it was obtained, as the French palæontologists to whom he had submitted the species had been unable to do so satisfactorily. The specimen, as I remarked, consisted of an internal cast
only,
but so characteristic was it of the Carboniferous period that, in returning it to him, I said that I had very little doubt as to its being a form closely allied to, if not identical with
Spirifer glabra,
and demonstrating the presence of rocks of the Carboniferous age.″

Mr Davidson concluded by an encomium of the catalogue of carboniferous fossils of the west of Scotland, prepared by Messrs John Young and James Armstrong of the Glasgow Geological Society, adding, ‶And surely the Edinburgh geologists, my own town’s palæontologists, will not like to confess themselves unable to learn and accomplish what the Glasgow men have done.″

It was moved by Mr Richardson, Honorary Secretary, seconded by Mr Henderson, Curator of the Museum, and unanimously agreed to—‶That as recommended by that eminent palæontologist, Thomas Davidson, Esq., F.R.S., F.G.S., Brighton, an Honorary Fellow of the Society, a special standing committee be appointed for the purpose of preparing for publication, from time to time in the Society’s Transactions, as complete lists as possible of the various species of fossils discovered in the three Lothians and Fife; said committee to consist of Messrs Henderson, Curator of the Museum; Somervail, late Curator; C. W. Peach, Associate; Thomas Smyth; D. J. Brown; George J. P. Grieve, Burntisland; Henry Walker, St Andrews; James Linn, Livingstone; George Lyon, Treasurer; and Ralph Richardson, Secretary, with power to add to their number; Mr Somervail to be Convener of the committee.″

*

The following Gentlemen were elected Fellows of the Society:—

Rev. A. S. M
yers
, Minister of the Parish of Benholm, Kincardineshire.

Rev. J
ames
C
ranbrook
, B.A., 1 Gayfield Place, late Vice-President of the Natural History and Geological Society of Tamworth, Warwickshire.

P
atrick
R
itchie
, Clerk (Messrs John Watherston & Sons, Builders), 29 Queensferry Street.