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than students alone. Probably the best known of these was The DorsetCoast, first published in 1935, with a second edition in 1956.

George MacDonald Davies did a great deal, in an unobtrusive way, tohelp many students enjoy geology and acquire wider interests in life. Hehad learned geology the hard way and changed his own career, and thisexperience enabled him to understand his students' problems and to assistthem in their efforts to gain a degree by part-time study. A former col­league of many years, who was in the Faculty of Arts, also had his interestaroused, and paid the following tribute. 'I remember that he got on wellwith all his colleagues. This was due partly to his gentle nature-he was soquiet and modest. But there was also something which we call bonhomie,and he was bonhomme-and one who charmed his many friends as muchby his courtesy as by his sense of humour:

A.F.S.

P.W.S.

EMILY DIX, n.sc., who was born in Gower on 21 May 1904, and who diedin January 1973, was an active member of the Association during a geo­logical life which was cut tragically short nearly thirty years before herdeath. The present writer is indebted to Professor W. G. Chaloner for anassessment of the importance of her palaeobotanical work.

Emily Dix entered the University College of Swansea in 1922, becominga student of A. E. Trueman. In 1925 she graduated with first class honoursin geology, and in 1927 she was awarded the degree of M.Sc. From 1927to 1928 she held a part-time demonstratorship in geology, and for severalyears she was research assistant to Professor (later Sir Arthur) Trueman.In 1933 she gained her D.Sc. (Wales).

In 1925 Trueman suggested that she should find out if the succession ofplants in the South Wales Coalfield was similar to that in the north ofFrance, and whether the system of zones developed in northern France byPaul Bertrand was applicable to South Wales. For the next eight years sheworked on macroscopic fossil plants from known horizons in South Walesand in other coalfields, and her results were published in 1934 in theTransactions 0/ the Royal Society of Edinburgh (vol. 57 for 1932-3). Hereshe divided the Upper Carboniferous of South Wales into nine floralzones; for most of these she named more than one index species, and indefining each zone she also considered the whole floral assemblage. Theextent to which her zonation could be applied outside its type area hasheen questioned, but the system proved useful, especially in the southernpart of Britain, and it superseded the demonstrably diachronous plant­based units ofLanarkian, Yorkian, Staffordian and Radstockian recognisedby Kidston, Her detailed quantitative recordings of the occurrence of

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species throughout the Coal Measures still remains a model to those seek­ing to use plant fossils as a basis for stratigraphical correlation.

In comparing the sequence of South Wales with that of France, Dr. Dixbelieved that the unit of the Stephanian, which on the continent succeedsthe Westphalian 0, was represented in Britain. Her viewwas not universallyaccepted, but the controversy continues to the present day, and even theadded evidence from palynology has not settled it.

Dr. Dix did not, however, confine her work to palaeobotany, but shealso studied non-marine lamellibranchs and their stratigraphical value inrelation to that of plants. The subjects of her papers ranged from thesporocarp of Neuropteris to the succession of the Millstone Grit in Gower,and from fossil arthropods to the petrology of rounded boulders associatedwith coal seams. Between 1924 and 1945 she published more than thirty­five papers and notes. About half were under her name alone; most of therest were written in collaboration with Professor Trueman, and somejointly with Dr. John Pringle and others.

In 1930 she was appointed Lecturer in Geology at Bedford College,University of London, coming to Cambridge with the College during thewar-time evacuation from 1939 to 1944. She was elected a Fellow of theGeological Society in 1929and was awarded the Murchison Fund in 1936.In 1930 she joined the Geologists' Association, and was a member ofCouncil from 1932 to 1946.From 1933 to 1937she served as Secretary forField Meetings, and from 1942 to 1946 she was a Vice-President. Sheexhibited on a number of occasions at the Annual Reunion, and a lecturewhich she gave, in connection with a demonstration, on structures in theCoal Measures of South Wales, was published in the PROCEEDINGS for1941. Together with Mr. C. W. Wright, she led a Field Meeting at Guild­ford and the Guildford Bypass in June 1945.

Dr. Dix was a sociable, lively and extremely active person. There is agood likeness of her in The Geologists' Association 1858-1958, edited byG. S. Sweeting (1958), where in Plate IV she is the fourth figure from theleft in the row nearest the camera.

Unhappily, in the late summer of 1945, she developed severe mentalillness from which she never recovered. M.A.A.

RICHARD PAYNE, M.I.MIN.E., F.G.S., died in 14 February 1973, his eighty­fourth birthday.

Born at Wimblebury, Hednesford, he was educated at Church HillSchool, Hednesford, and began work at Cannock Chase No.9 Colliery in1902.After attending evening classesat Hednesford Technical Institute, hegained a three-year scholarship to Birmingham University.