68 THE IBIS 



matter of the Royal Society," which is explained by the 

 following letter, written ten days before his death. 



The College, Durham, 



February 25, 1906. 



MY DEAR NEWTON, 



It is utterly impossible to get out of your debt 

 epistolary, as I have found ever since that unparalleled 

 act of friendship many years ago, when you took off your 

 name from the Royal Society in order to secure my 

 election. When one looks back through the long vista of 

 years there is nothing I have found to equal it for self- 

 sacrifice and generosity. But, that apart, there is only 

 one sense of generous fraternity. I am glad to deliver 

 my soul. 



In my present state of health the political outlook 

 hardly interests me, for I am very ill. The doctor stays 

 in the house with me generally all night, as I suffer from 

 breathlessness, but I have had the comfort of having my 

 family, eight children and my sons-in-law gathered round 

 me yesterday. 



Before my attack became worse I was able to enjoy 

 two papers in the Ibis on Ross' Rosy Gull and the 

 Scotch Antarctic, as well as to glance at my old friend 

 Mr. Whitaker's Tunisia, which resuscitated many 

 interests of bygone years. I dare say this may be my last 

 letter. 



Your sincere old friend, 



H. B. TRISTRAM. 



Tristram was distinguished as a traveller, a naturalist, 

 and an antiquary. He devoted himself particularly to 

 the ornithology of Northern Africa, about which he wrote 

 several most interesting papers in the early numbers of 

 the Ibis, and of Palestine, which he visited several times 

 and described in published volumes. In those countries 

 he made many ornithological discoveries, and his sudden 

 and unexpected departures were a constant source of 

 mystification to his friends, among whom he was known 



