38 Linnean Society. [May 24, 



May 24. 

 The Lord Bishop of Norwich, President, in the Chair. 



This day, the anniversary of the birth of Linnaeus, and that ap- 

 pointed by the Charter for the Election of Council and Officers, the 

 President opened the business of the day, and the Secretary read 

 the following notices of those Members of the Society with whose 

 decease he had become acquainted during the year. 



Sir John Barrow, Bart., was the son of a small farmer, and born at 

 Dragley Beck, in the neighbourhood of Ulverstone, Lancashire, on 

 the 19th of June 1764. After an ordinary school education, and 

 a short initiation into trade in an iron-foundry at Liverpool, he made 

 a voyage in a Greenland whale ship, the captain of which was his 

 friend. Subsequently his mathematical knowledge, which he had 

 sedulously cultivated, qualified him to act as tutor in that depart- 

 ment in a large academy at Greenwich ; and by means of his pupils 

 in this establishment he was introduced to a large circle of acquaint- 

 ance, and among others to the late Sir George Staunton, by whom 

 he was engaged to give instruction in mathematics to his son, the 

 present baronet of that name. This introduction proved a most 

 fortunate event to Mr. Barrow, for Sir George having been named 

 Secretary to Lord Macartney's Embassy to China, obtained for him 

 the appointment of Comptroller of the Household, in which capa- 

 city he accompanied the Embassy. To the ' Authentic Account ' 

 of the Mission published by Sir George Staunton he contributed 

 much valuable information, which he some years afterwards com- 

 pleted by the publication of his own volume of ' Travels in China.' 

 Soon after his return to England, Lord Macartney was appointed 

 Governor of the Cape of Good Hope, then newly captured from the 

 Dutch, and thither also Mr. Barrow accompanied him as one of his 

 private secretaries. The two volumes of ' Travels into the Interior 

 of Southern Africa,' which Mr. Barrow subsequently published, made 

 the public fully acquainted with the extent, capabilities and re- 

 sources of that important acquisition. They evince also, together 

 with his ' Travels in China,' but in a higher degree, that among the 

 varied stores of information with which his active mind was fraught, 

 natural history had not been neglected, and contain much inter- 

 esting information in a popular form on the plants and animals of a 

 region at that time little known to English travellers. After Lord 

 Macartney's retirement, Mr, Barrow remained at the Cape, where 



