VOL XL] [PART II. PROCEEDINGS OP THE YORKSHIRE GEOLOGICAL AND POLYTECHNIC SOCIETY. EDITED BY JAMES W. DAVIS, F.S.A., F.G.S., &o. 1889. BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICES OF EMINENT YORKSHIRE GEOLOGISTS. NO. IV. HUGH EDWIN STRICKLAND, E.R.S., ETC. BY JAMES W. DAVIS. Hugh Edwin Strickland was the second son of Henry Eustasius Strickland, a younger son of the late Sir George Strickland, Bart., of Boynton, and Mary, the eldest daughter of Edmund Cartwright, D.D., F.R.S. He was born on the 2nd March, 1811, at ileigliton, in the East Riding of Yorkshire, a small village situate between Bridlington and Scarborough, looking down upon the beautiful bay of Filey. His father occupied a farm of considerable extent in the vicinity. The locality was retired, and the bold features of the neighbouring cliffs of Speeton and Filey could not fail to impress the mind of even a child, and there can be little doubt that frequent rambles on this interesting coast, and the fossils which he would pick up from the Speeton cliffs or the chalk escarpment, formed a strong basis towards his subsequent inclination to the study of geology, Strickland was in the habit, even when a boy, of writing down his impressions in the form of a journal. In this diary he records that his earliest recol• lections commenced when he was staying at Hildenley, near Malton, with two of his father's sisters, whilst his father, mother, brother, and sister, were on a visit to the south. This was in the end of 1814. " I remember the party returning and taking me home to Reighton. I also remember my fourth birthday which came soon after. About this time my above-mentioned aunts, whose names were Julia and 140 DAVIS: HUGH EDWIN STRICKLAND, F.H.S., ETC. Charlotte, left Hildenley and bought a house in Gloucestershire, near Tewkesbury, having about three hundred acres of good land belonging to it, whither they went and have lived there ever since." In the Spring of 1820, when he was nine years old, a private tutor was engaged to instruct him at home, and from that period the beginning of his classical education may be dated. Although the regularity of the proposed plan of education was interrupted by accidental circumstances, it was still continued until the year 1827 at his father's house. He then became a pupil of Dr. Arnold, before his appointment as headmaster of the Rugby School. In February, 1822, he met with an accident arising from a boyish exertion of strength, which sprained his back, and rendered necessary his removal to London, where he was placed under the care of Dr. Harrison, an old friend of the family. For many months he was obliged to maintain a reclining position, and it was nearly twelve months before his health was completely restored. This long illness must have been irksome to a comparative child, but a taste for reading was formed and encouraged, and a bias was given which influenced the future inclinations of his mind. " It will be easy thus to perceive," his mother writes, "the causes that seemed to encourage so marked a bias as lie had already shown in favour of the physical sciences. The country around our new residence at Henley, has a very different aspect in its beautiful woods and meadows from that of Flamborough and Filey, it abounds in subjects of interest sufficient to gratify the most determined naturalist, and it was no wonder that feeling himself restored to health and strength he should eagerly return to those pursuits with delight, increased from the variety and novelty of a fresh field of observation." An additional encouragement had also arisen in the assistance of his brother Algernon, who had now arrived at an age to bring to memory the happy companionship of his much- loved brother Henry, and collections were formed and plans of classi• fication devised by these yet juvenile and simple naturalists. Whilst on a visit to Yorkshire to his uncle, Sir William Strickland, in the Spring of 1824, he took the opportunity of going to Reighton, where he seems to have experienced a disappointment often felt by those who anticipate peculiar pleasure on revisiting the scenes of early DAVIS: HUGH EDWIN STRICKLAND, F.R.S., ETC. 141 childhood. " Poor Reighton is altered much, and chiefly for worse ; many things are fallen down and but few are built up. Speeton Beacon and the aged patriarch of Thorn Tree Flat still exist, though probably in a mutilated state. Horses and cattle run at liberty about the plantation behind the stables and the yard, which is overgrown with weeds. The plantation at the back of the kitchen garden has got up surprisingly. It was with difficulty I could force my way through the shrubs to the seat and table, both of which 1 found buried among the trees." The general tendency towards a cultivation of natural history and of a somewhat roving disposition are illustrated by the following passage from his diary:—"A taste for natural history which I had acquired and which still continued unabated, was in• creased by a trip which our party together with Lady Strickland, her son Arthur, and her daughter Emma, took to Little Hampton in Sussex, where we spent seven weeks very agreeably in collecting shells, etc. In July I went with my father to Apperley in Gloucestershire, where we stayed a fortnight with my aunts, and then returned home, when 1 resumed my studies along with my two brothers. At the end of this year I was informed that it was settled that I should go to Oxford in three or four years' time. This was a death-blow to all my hopes, as I had always entertained a dread of going to college as being an almost inevitable cause of my taking root in England; whereas I had always cherished a hope of being a sailor, or at least of engaging in some locomotive profession, which should oblige me to roam about and see the world, and this hope, though repeatedly smothered, had never till this final decision of my fate been totally extinguished, and much did I grieve to see my cousin and former play• fellow, George Cartwright, enter the navy, nay, to see my own brother and of late my almost only companion, Algernon, destined for the same profession, while I am doomed to spend the rest of my days in the capacity or rather incapacity of an English country gentleman." This was written in 1826, when Strickland was about fifteen years of age. In the Autumn of the same year, he spent some weeks in Lincolnshire with his uncle and aunt, Mr. and Mrs. Penrose. The latter was the daughter of Edmund Cartwright, and was the authoress of the popular Histories of England, France, etc., under 142 DAVIS: HUGH EDWIN STRICKLAND, F.R.S., ETC. the nom de plume of Mrs. Markhani. Whilst there he wrote to his mother:—" I have now accumulated sufficient news to fill a letter. Mrs. Markham is deeply involved in the affairs of France, which are to be cleared up and publicly declared in December. A rival work is advertised under the title of History of Spain, on the plan of Mrs. Markham's History of England. Several of the engravings from France have arrived. They are on wood, and are well executed. You ask me how I employ my time. I am usually employed in learning Greek, etc., which my uncle is so good as to hear me say after dinner. Then in the middle of the day I either go to Lincoln with my uncle and aunt, both or neither, or I take a walk somewhere to potter after fossils. In the evening we generally read aloud to my great aunt Frances some of the Waverley Novels, or I read Parkinson's s Organic Remains' to myself." At this time, as throughout the whole period of his life, Strickland was very industrious, and no branch of natural history appears to have come amiss. He was an indefatigable collector, and whether the objects lived in the air, gambolled in the water, or were preserved fossilized in the rocks, all seem to have come naturally under his supervision. In his diary of the 27th January, 1827, he records that he " finished writing the list of British shells with their habitats, which I flatter myself is very complete, as it con• tains many new species with a vast number of habitats. This work has occupied me, with the exception of three months when I was in Lincolnshire, since last April, and has been almost entirely composed between the hours of six and nine in the morning." A few days later he despatched a letter to the Mechanics' Magazine, signed " Boreas," describing a plan he had invented for uniting a wind gauge to a weathercock, and exhibiting the results of both upon two dial plates. Other short articles followed, and in due course appeared in the journal. He collected and stuffed birds, and probably about this time the strong attachment exhibited in after years to ornithological pur• suits was formed and fostered. The ordinary school-boy's studies, however, were not neglected, and the tuition of Mr. Arnold laid a solid basis of future knowledge. He thus describes the routine course whilst under the care of this gentleman:—"Mr. Arnold sits in his own room, and each of us in turn go in to say our lessons to him DAVIS: HUGH EDWIN STRICKLAND, F.R.S., ETC, 143 twice a day according to the above-mentioned precedence, so that when the last has been in the first time, it is time for the first to go in the second time.