clxxxiv Journal of Proceedings.
views of this great master in palaeontology." From 1865 to his death he
was assistant editor of the ' Geological Magazine.'
In the year 1855, after having made two geological tours through
Europe with Sir E. J. Murchison, Prof. Morris was appointed to the
chair of geology at University College, and continued to hold this post
till 1877. During his professorship, besides the lectures and demonstra-
tions to his class, he delivered many courses at other institutions ; and
for two years acted as Deputy-professor at Cambridge during the last
days of Prof. Sedgwick. He was, in 1877, presented with the honorary
degree of Master of Arts by the senate of the University of Cambridge.
Though his published papers are both numerous and valuable, his
dislike to writing prevents them from being anything like a full record
of his intellectual work. His chief delight was the full and free com-
munication of geological knowledge, both in the class-room and the
field. I once heard his special characteristic as a teacher put thus : " X
will tell you what a fossil is, but Morris will point out how you may see
what it is for yourself." He was a very frequent attendant at the
excursions of the Geologists' Association, down to about the year 1882,
to the great delight and advantage of those present, who were pleased
to see him, both as a friend, and also as a teacher whose vast stores of
scientific knowledge were always available for the elucidation of knotty
points, and the determination of doubtful specimens.
The date of the formation of the Essex Field Club has prevented us
from knowing him as well as he was known to the members of the
Geologists' Association, of which society he was twice president. It is
pleasant to record, however, that he took much interest in our progress,
which he showed, inter alia, by subscribing to our Denehole Exploration
Fund. Probably no scientific man of our day had a larger number of
acquaintances, and certainly in no case was an acquaintance so invariably
something more. The few words uttered by the President of the
Geological Society, on announcing the death of Prof. Morris, are, there-
fore, almost equally applicable if addressed to the Essex Field Club :
" The Society has lost its most learned member, and many of us have
been deprived of a very dear friend."
Among the ordinary members we have lost during the past year, I
think some mention should be made here of Mr. George Burney, of
Millwall and Crooms Hill, Greenwich. He was one of our original
members, and though his name does not appear in our Transactions, he
was a man whose memory should be held in special honour by a Club
having its headquarters in Epping Forest. For Mr. Burney was among
the foremost, as a commoner of the Forest, to protest against the illegal
enclosures of large portions of it. He did this very forcibly, on one
occasion, by bringing down a large party of workmen and demolishing
certain fences ; an act which, by showing the public spirit and determi-
nation with which irregular appropriators had to reckon, largely
conduced to the equitable settlement at last attained. In a time like
the present, when footpaths are stopped, and " stealing the common from
the goose " is practised wherever it can be done with safety through the
absence of men able and willing to fight the matter in the law courts,
services of this kind certainly demand our warm and hearty recognition.
[The remainder of Mr. Holmes' Address, being " Notes on the
Evidence bearing upon British Ethnology," is printed in the ' Transac-
tions,' vol. iv., pp. 189-228.]
Prof. Meldola, in moving a vote of thanks to Mr. Holmes for his
services as President, and also to the other officers of the Club, referred
to the value of Mr. Holmes' paper as a concise summary of the principal