Page:Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, vol. 25.djvu/47

 to comprehend, and largely to justify, the course taken by the French geologists. Columbus discovered the new world ; and great is his fame for that achievement, history, like some other great powers, always paying upon results : but those who will look carefully into the matter will find that most of his reasons for believing in the existence of the new land which he discovered were either insufficient or erroneous, and might well fail to carry conviction to the minds of the much-abused kings and ministers who so long withheld their help to his great enterprise.

And I venture to doubt whether, if any cautious person were now to read the ' Antiquites Celtiques,' he would rise from its perusal with the feeling that the author's case had been even approximately made out — whether, perhaps, he would not rather be prejudiced against it. Eminently generous, truthful, hearty, and enthusiastic, Boucher de Perthes paid for these virtues by a certain facility of belief, which is as terrible a drawback to scientific weight as it is advantageous in the struggle against neglect and adverse criticism when a man happens to have laid hold of a truth.

I say this much in justification of own confreres across the channel, and in vindication of caution and scientific logic, with which I, for one, prefer to err, rather than to be right in the company of haste and guesswork. Posterity, a somewhat short-sighted personage, who, as I have said, pays only upon results, will take no note of the protest, and will not only award to our Columbus all the credit which he deserves for being substantially in the right, but will probably abuse those of his contemporaries who were equally in the right for disbelieving him.

The death of M. A. Morlot, which took place at Berne, in February last, was announced at the last Anniversary. I borrow the substance of the following notice of his life from the " Materiaux " of M. G. de Mortillet.

M. Morlot commenced his career as a geologist, and greatly occupied himself with geology, in Austria. In Switzerland, where he subsequently took up his abode, he very successfully combined archaeology with geology, and when he died was Conservator of the Archaeological Museum of Berne. Although a Professor of Geology in Lausanne, he devoted himself to prehistoric studies, and greatly contributed to their progress by his investigations, his writings, and the public lectures which he was continually giving in one place or another.

The chief palaeo-ethnological work of M. Morlot is entitled 'Etudes Geologico-Archeologiques en Danemark et en Suisse,' which was published at Lausanne in March 1860 in the ' Bulletin de la Societe Vaudoise des Sciences Naturelles.' It is an excellent resume, which has been of great use in spreading far and wide a knowledge of the important discoveries made in Denmark and Switzerland.

The discovery upon which M. Morlot laid most weight, is that of the " Cone de la Tiniere," which he converted into a chronometer for measuring the duration of the different prehistoric epochs. M. Morlot's last production is a great work upon Mecklembourg.