1899] OBITUARY 153 



of the Directorship were devoted to the completion of the life-size series of 

 models of the latter animals, which now form such an attractive feature of the 

 Museum, and also to the formation of an anthropological gallery which should 

 worthily head the zoological series of the museum. Fortunately, he was 

 enabled to witness the opening of the new whale gallery, which took place on 

 Whit Monday of last year • but the comparatively advanced stage now reached 

 by the anthropological series has been the work of other hands in the enforced 

 absence of the originator. 



With regard to the general scope and importance of Sir William Flower's 

 scientific work, it is perhaps too early to form an exact opinion. The anatomy, 

 classification, and distribution of the Mammalia undoubtedly formed his favourite 

 themes ; and it is largely to his influence and writings that our conceptions of 

 the mutual relations of the different members of the class are due. Of course 

 he was not infallible, as the present views as to the relationship of the mar- 

 supials to other mammals alone sufficiently attest. But he was remarkable for 

 his devotion to accuracy ; and the pains he would devote to the elucidation of 

 small obscure points are well worthy the imitation of many of his more impetuous 

 followers. Although no grand discovery or great generalisation is associated 

 with the name of Flower, the amount of solid zoological work he has done, and, 

 above all, the revolution which he has brought about in our conceptions of what 

 a museum should be, cannot fail to have a marked influence on his successors 

 for many years to come. We have not yet noticed that, in addition to being a 

 zoologist, Sir William was also a most competent palaeontologist. And yet to 

 him such a disassociation of ideas as these terms imply would have been in the 

 highest degree repugnant, for it was a dominant idea of his that palaeontology 

 is but the zoology of the past, and that the two subjects should be treated as 

 one. This combination of palaeontological and zoological knowledge gave him a 

 far wider conception of the relations of the various groups of the animal kingdom 

 than is held by many of his contemporaries ; and, although the force of cir- 

 cumstances prevented its accomplishment, it was his earnest desire to see, so 

 far as practicable, the amalgamation of the recent and extinct specimens ex- 

 hibited to the public in the great institution confided to his charge. 



Although the number of scientific memoirs which stand in his name is very 

 large, Sir William Flower is known to the general public by comparatively few 

 works. Allusion has been already made to the " Catalogues " of the Museum 

 of the Boyal College of Surgeons and to the " Osteology of the Mammalia." 

 To the ninth edition of the " Encyclopaedia Britannica," Sir William contributed 

 the important article " Mammalia," as well as a number of minor articles on 

 various representatives of the same group. These articles, together with a few 

 by other writers, were subsequently, with the aid of the present writer, collected 

 and expanded, so as to take the form of a systematic treatise published 

 under the title of "An Introduction to the Study of Mammals" (1891). Later 

 on in the same year appeared a little volume on "The Horse," in the "Modern 

 Science " series ; while the above-mentioned " Essays on Museums and other 

 Subjects connected' with Natural History " was published, under saddening 

 circumstances, only last year. To allude to any of the numerous memoirs on 

 technical subjects is obviously impossible on this occasion. Although somewhat 

 reserved, and, perhaps, even occasionally cold in manner, Sir William Flower 

 was greatly esteemed and beloved by a large circle of friends, both scientific and 

 otherwise. When once the thin veneer of reserve was penetrated, no man 

 could be kinder ; and the trouble and attention he would devote to all who 

 claimed his assistance were almost inexhaustible. To the present writer (if he 

 may be permitted to say so) the loss is a very real and a very personal one. 

 His first recollection of Sir William was in the Cambridge Natural Science 

 Tripos of 1871, when the candidate little thought that he would one day be 

 asked to join the (apparently) stern examiner in writing a treatise on one of 

 the subjects of examination. B. Lydekkee. 



