Another literary man in Edinburgh who had also made some interesting contributions to geology was Robert Chambers. He especially concerned himself with the later phases of geological history, more particularly the proofs that Britain had been overspread with ice, and that important changes of level had taken place along the coasts of Scotland and northern Norway. He was also generally believed to be the author of the famous Vestiges of Creation—a belief which was fully confirmed after his death. When he heard that I purposed to become a member of the Geological Survey he gave me, I remember, an account of a recent excursion which he had made with a party of the Survey in North Wales. ‘Being the oldest member of the company,’ he said, ‘I was voted into the chair, and had to carve. A leg of Welsh mutton was placed before me, from which I was kept supplying the demands of the geologists, until there was nothing left on the dish but a bare bone. So if you join the Survey, my young friend, you must be prepared for the development of a portentous appetite.’

CHAMBERS, FLEMING, NICOL

The house of Robert Chambers in Edinburgh was one of the chief centres at which literary and scientific strangers met the intellectual society of the town. He was an excellent host. His fund of anecdote and reminiscence went back to near the beginning of the century. When no more than twenty years of age he had published a volume illustrative of the Waverley novels, followed next year by two volumes of Traditions of Edinburgh, which astonished Scott, who wondered where the boy could have picked up all the information.

Besides the geologists here enumerated there were others contemporary with them who did good service, but with whom my acquaintance was too slight to furnish me now with any personal reminiscences of them. Dr. John Fleming, author of the well-known Philosophy of Zoology, was trained as a Wernerian, and never quite adopted the views of modern geologists. I remember him as a tall rather grim figure, full of personal kindness, and gifted with keen critical power. He seemed never to be happier than when he had an opportunity of exercising that power in sarcastically demolishing the arguments of those to whom he was opposed. James Nicol, after he became Professor in Aberdeen in 1853, devoted himself with much enthusiasm and success to the study of the Highland rocks, and I only met him occasionally at the meetings of the British Association, where his tall figure, his abundant sandy-coloured hair, and pronounced south-country accent, made him a prominent personage.

In the early decades of last century a few students from foreign countries were attracted to Scotland for the purpose of examining the rocks, which since the days of the Huttonian and Wernerian controversy had become famous on the Continent. In my journeys abroad I met three of these veterans, each of whom retained a vivid recollection of his stay in this country.

W. Haidinger, who was long at the head of the Austrian Geological Survey and Museum in Vienna, had established his reputation as an able mineralogist, and came to Scotland to study the various cabinets of minerals, public and private, to be found in the country. When I saw him in Vienna in 1869, he had retired from all official duties, and as he sat in his study, surrounded with his books and papers, presented a singularly picturesque appearance, not unlike that in which Faust is usually represented on the stage before transformation into youth by Mephistopheles. Enveloped in a long dressing gown, he sat in an easy chair, his white beard flowing down his breast, and his head covered with an equal exuberance of snowy hair (which, however, was said to be a wig), while his feet were encased in large warm slippers. He remembered well the various mineral collections he had studied in Scotland, and was interested in hearing about the places he had seen, and the survivors of the acquaintances he had made.

HAIDINGER, VON DECHEN, BOUÉ

H. von Dechen came to Scotland in 1827, and travelled over a good deal of the country, of which he subsequently gave an account in one of the German scientific journals. I first met him in Bonn, where he had a large house commanding fine views up to the Siebengebirge, which he had studied so minutely and described so carefully. His age, the number and excellence of his geological writings, and his friendly interest in the career of younger men made him the popular Nestor of Prussian geologists. The last time I met him was in Berlin on the occasion of the meeting of the International Geological Congress in 1885, of which he was president. There was one lady member present at his address, and the audience was amused by the formal courtesy with which he began—‘Lady and Gentlemen.’

Ami Boué had an interesting history. He was descended from a French family which could trace its pedigree back for some 400 years. In the reign of Louis XIV, his ancestor, being Protestant, had to escape from Bordeaux in a barrel. Boué himself was born in Hamburg. His mother had been educated in Geneva, and French was the language she used in her family circle. His early education was also given in Geneva, but as the French armies had overrun Europe, and the family property in Hamburg consisted largely of houses, which might at any moment be destroyed in the political convulsions, it was considered desirable that Ami should have a profession to fall back upon, in case of any such catastrophe. He was accordingly sent to Edinburgh to study medicine. As he long after remarked to me, ‘I really went to Scotland to escape from Napoleon.’ But although, when Napoleon was finally crushed at Waterloo, the Hamburg property was saved, Boué determined to continue his medical studies and to take his degree, which he gained in 1817.

AMI BOUÉ