FELTX CULnERT \VILTSt[E.VR 117 



FELIX GILBERT WILTSHEAR. 



(1882-1917.) 



More than one young botanist of promise has paid the toll 

 demanded by this country in the course of the terrible War forced upon 

 us by Grermany, but these were taken before their work had matured, 

 and before they had established the reputation which they would 

 doubtless have acquired. Hence the death of the subject of this 

 notice at a period when his cajjabilities were fully developed and 

 when the value of his work had been recognized, not only by his 

 colleagues but by all who had visited the National Herbarium for 

 purposes of study, will be felt by all who knew him as a serious loss 

 and one which it will be difficult to supply. 



Felix Gilbert Wiltshear was born in Kensington Jan. 15, 1882 : 

 an elder brother, who had preceded him in the Department left 

 in February, 1896, and Felix succeeded him as boy-attendant, being 

 then fifteen years old. He had received an excellent education at 

 St. Mary Abbots School, Kensington, where he had learned to write 

 a very good hand. This led to his employment in the making of 

 indexes to volumes in which these necessary adjuncts to book-work 

 had been omitted or inadequately supplied, and later, as his know- 

 ledge and aptitude increased, to some of the Departmental MSS. and 

 collections of drawings, where they stand as evidence of his neatness 

 and carefulness. 



At that time the Departmental Lil)rary was more or less under my 

 care, and I soon discovered that Wiltshear, although not then directly 

 connected with it, had that flair for books and for matters connected 

 with them which, though not easily definable, marks the born biblio- 

 grapher. In his development in this direction I was able to afford 

 .some help; and when, in the interregnum between the resignation of 

 Mr. Murray in 1905 and the appointment of Dr. Rendle, I was in 

 charge of the Department, the opportunity occurred of placing Wilt- 

 shear in charge of the Library, I gladly availed myself of it, and 

 thus, though through no merit of my own, became entitled to the 

 gratitude of all subsecjuent workers in the Department. The help 

 which Wiltshear was always able and willing to give them was rendered 

 the more acceptable by his modest and pleasant manner, as well as by 

 his intimate knowledge of the position of the volumes ; it was usually 

 sufficient to name a book, and he would produce it without referring 

 to the catalogue. He had also the gift of accuracy in a marked 

 degree, whether in making extracts, verifying references, or compiling 

 catalogues — in a word, he was in every respect thoroughly to be 

 depended on. 



In the course of his work, Wiltshear came across various points 

 of bibliographical interest; his contributions (in the volumes for 

 1909, 1912-14) to the "Bibliographical Notes" which have for many 

 years formed a feature of this Journal attord evidence of the care 

 and thoroughness which chai*acterized his investigations. These 

 however by no means represent his minute and exact knowledge, 

 evidence of which is present in the books of the Library in the form 



