IN MEMORIAM — GEORGE WALKER ORD. 319 



In Memoriam— George Walker Ord. 



George Walker Ord, who died from peritonitis on 9th August, 

 1899, after three days' illness, was born in the parish of King- 

 Edward, Aberdeenshire, in 1871, and was educated at Macduff 

 Public School. 



Of a delicate constitution as a boy, and with health rendered 

 precarious by the rigours of the north-east climate, the class-room 

 had more attraction for him than the playground, and he soon 

 became a bright and favourite pupil of the head-master, Mr. 

 Renton. On leaving school, he was sent to work in the fields, 

 almost the only form of labour to be obtained in that part of the 

 country, but one ill-suited for a delicate youth, and there can be 

 no doubt that it is to his early experience here that must be attri- 

 buted the sympathy he had with the labouring classes, and the 

 remedies proposed for the amelioration of their condition. 



Coming to Glasgow at the age of fifteen, he secured a post under 

 the Corporation in the Kelvingrove Museum, and here his genius 

 and temperament found congenial work, and his love for the study 

 of natural history, which had already declared itself, became his 

 abiding passion. The translation from the East Coast, with its 

 consequent change of climate, brought about a remarkable and 

 favourable change in his health, and Mdthin a year or so after his 

 arrival in Glasgow he began his investigations into the flora and 

 fauna of the West of Scotland, throwing into the work all the 

 enthusiasm which characterises the youthful and ardent lover of 

 nature. His abilities and rare aptitude for his professional duties 

 were fully recognised by his superiors, and on the opening of the 

 People's Palace in Glasgow Green he was appointed Superin- 

 tendent. He did much good work at this Institution, and mention 

 may be made in this respect of the Glen Collection of Minerals, 

 Rocks, and Fossils, which he overhauled and arranged with all the 

 loving care and patience of the most devoted geologist, w^iile he 

 displayed no mean skill in settling anew the identity of specimens 

 whose labels had been lost, or had become detached and been 

 replaced on the wrong specimen. 



