Sir Andrew Crombie Ramsay

Abstract

THOUGH this illustrious geologist has been laid aside by growing infirmity for the last ten years, the news of his death will carry regret into the hearts of many men of science, not in this country only but all over the world. Born in Glasgow, and intended for a mercantile profession there, he spent some few years in business; but, partly on account of delicate health, betook himself for rest and open-air exercise to the island of Arran. One of the friends of his early years. Prof. Nichol, of Glasgow University, the well-known writer on. astronomical subjects, had much influence in directing his studies into a scientific channel, so that the marvellous geological lessons to be learnt from the rocks of Arran soon arrested Ramsay's attention. Throwing himself with all the ardour of an enthusiastic nature not to the pursuit which he not took up, he was led to climb the mountains and traverse the glens throughout the length and breadth of Arran. In this way, face to face with the facts of Nature, and amid some of the most charming scenery of his native country, he taught himself the rudiments of geology, and acquired that clearness of insight for geological structure, that love of mountain-forms, and that freshness and originality of interpretation, which marked him out from his associates in later years. But above all, by actually mapping the grouping of the rocks, he gained that precision in field-work which was to bear such notable fruit in his connection with the Geological Survey. He constructed a geological model of Arran on the scale of two inches to a mile, and made copious notes of the geological structure of all parts of the island.