xxviii
Literary Gazette.’ In a letter to Williamson, referring to this,
Dr. Buckland said, "I am happy to have been instrumental in
bringing before the public a name to which look forward as likely
to figure in the annals of British science." "The letter of Dr. Buck-
land," says Williamson, " was one of those influences the effect of
which was unmitigatedly healthy."
In 1835 Williamson was appointed curator of the musenm of the Natural History Society at Manchester, an office which he held for three years while pursuing his medical studies. Several papers, chiefly on geological subjects, were the fruit of this period. In 1840 Williamson left Manchester and came np to London, where he entered as a student at University College. He here attended the lectures of the botanist Lindley, who now for the first time made the personal acquaintance of his young coadjutor.
While in London he was offered the post of naturalist to an expe- dition up the Niger, an offer which, fortunately for him and for science, he declined, for the undertaking ended disastrously.
After about a year's work in London, Williamson passed his qualifying examinations at the Apothecaries' Hall and College of Surgeons, and then returned to Manchester, where he at once com menced the practice of medicine. At first he found it necessary to keep his scientific pursuits somewhat in the background, but this did not last long. His interest in Ehrenberg's discovery of the Foramini fera in chalk led him to undertake microscopic research, a field of inquiry on which he had not previously entered. His first histo logical investigation, in 1842, related to the development of bone, a subject to which he returned a few years later. In the meantime he engaged seriously in the study of Foraminifera, following up Ehrenberg's work above referred to. Among the naturalists who supplied him with material for this investigation was Charles Darwin, then just returned from his famous voyage in the "Beagle." The results of Williamson's studies were embodied in a paper published in the Transactions of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Man- chester for 1845, on "Some Microscopical Objects found in the Mud of the Levant and other Deposits, ith Remarks on the mode of Formation of Calcareous and Infusorial Siliceous Rocks." This was the most important of his works up to that date, and helped to lay the foundation of our knowledge of the part played by Foraminifera in the formation of geological deposits.
Williamson continued the study of these minute organisms, confirming the conclusions of Dujardin as to their affinities, and demonstrating the great variability of the living species. Many years later, in 1857, he completed his monograph for the Ray Society on the
Reminiscences of a Yorkshire Naturalist,' page 47
