PETER MACOWAN, 



B.A., D.Sc. F.L.S., F.R.H.S. 



(Bom 14II1 Nox'i:, 18 jo, Died :;ofli Xorr.. igog.) 



The closing year of the twentieth century's first decade finds 

 " Science in South Africa " still in its infancy. Speaking broadly, 

 scientific study, with special reference to this sub-continent, does 

 not date back further than the present generation. But such 

 a statement cannot be taken as all-embracing : there are excep- 

 tions. In one or two branches of science the work of research 

 has been pursued successively throughout an already long, and 

 ever lengthening, chain of scientists. Astronomy is one of these 

 exceptions. The oldest now living cannot have any personal 

 recollection even of Fearon Fallows, the first Cape Astronomer 

 Royal, but the labours of Lacaille throw back one's thoughts 

 another eighty years, to a time close on 160 years ago. There is 

 one more exception ; the systematic study of South African Botany 

 possesses an honoured bead-roll considerably longer than can be 

 claimed for any other branch of science in South Africa. Olden- 

 land, Ecklon and Zeyher, Bowie, Drege, Thunberg, Harvey and 

 Sonder. Pappe — all these have long passed away, but their names 

 are household words wherever South African Botany has been 

 studied. 



To this list of the distinguished dead must now be added the 

 name of MacOwan. 



" De mortuis nil nisi bonum, but of the living let us say absolutely 

 nil, good or bad ; lest in the one case we cause such modesty as 

 they have to blush, or in the other case we make an enemy." These 

 were his own words, three and twenty years ago, uttered in the 

 course of an address on " Personalia of botanical collectors at the 

 Cape." The bar he had himself thus placed across our lips now 

 drops away, and in the fewest possible words we would record 

 some details of the life and work of one who, for many years, was 

 looked upon as a general referee in South African Botany, and in 

 all matters pertaining to plant culture. 



Peter MacOwan was a Yorkshireman. He was born at Hull 

 nearly fourscore years ago. Like many another before and after 

 him, the branch of study which first attracted his attention was 

 not that whereon the most important work of his life was built. 

 It was to Chemistry that he turned his earlier steps — in fact, he 

 had attained the age of fifty-one ere he definitely abandoned 

 chemical science in favour of that which claimed his later life. 

 His student days were spent in London, and it was at London 

 University that he took his B.A. degree. 



In 1859, at the age of twenty-nine, Mr. MacOwan was appointed 

 Professor of Chemistry at Huddersfield College, a position which 

 he occupied for three years. But the young professor's health 



