C'2 THE jorHN-vr. ur noiANV 



BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, etc. 



The Kew Bulletin published in December (1916, no 10; the 

 volumes are not numbered) contains an account, with biblioc^raphj^ of 

 the late Hexrv Harold Welch Pearsox, whose de.ith took place 

 at Mount Royal Hospital, Wynbero^, Cape Town, on November 3. 

 Born at Long Sutton, Lincolnshire, on Jan. 2S, 1870, he went to 

 Cambridge m 1898, where he graduated B.A. three years later; in 

 1897 he visited Ceylon as a Travelling SciuUir of the Univ^ersity, and 

 on his return was a'ppointed Assistant Curator of the University 

 Herbarium. \\\ 1899 Pearson becam3 Assistant for India in the 

 Kew Herbarium, and at the end of 18J0 joined the Kew statf. In 

 1903 he was ap])ointjd to the chair of Botany (since known as the 

 Harry Bolus Professorship) in the South Af rie m University, which 

 he held to his deatli ; we understand that he will be succeeled by 

 Dr. C. E. Moss. During his residence in S>)uth Africa Pearson 

 undertook various journeys into the interior, which were productive of 

 interesting results ; in the course of these he visited the " Wehvitschia 

 Desert," and many of his most important investigations were connected 

 with the remarkable ])lant indicated. The military occupation of 

 South Africa by the Union Forces has afforded an opportunity for the 

 preservation of Weltcitschid, which has been ordered by official 

 proclamation of the Administrator of the Protectorate of South- West 

 Africa, reproduced in the number of the Bulletin already referred to. 



In the same number is recorded the death of Mr. E. Gr. Kenstt, a 

 member of the staff of the Bolus Herbarium since 1912, who was 

 killed in action on 17th July last, at Delville Wood. 



The Naturalist for Januar}^ contains a notice of Charles Cross- 

 land, who died at his residence at Halifax in his seventy-second year 

 on the 9th of December last. Actively engaged as he was in business, 

 Crossland found time for an infinity of work, bibliographical as well 

 as botanical ; his proficiency in the latter is the more remarkable in 

 that it was not until he was in his fortieth year that he took up the 

 study of plants. Although possessed of a fair knowledge of British 

 plants in general, it was to cryptogams, and specially to fungi, that 

 his attention was principally devoted. Besides numerous papers on 

 fur:gi in the Naturalist and in other local publications, Crossland was 

 associated with Mr. W. B. Crump in The Flora of the Pariah of 

 Halifax (1904), for which he undertook the cryptogams, and with 

 Mr. Massee in The Funr/us Flora of Yorkshire (190o). The diffi- 

 culty of preserving fungi led Crossland to represent them by drawings ; 

 in this art he attained great perfection, and his collection was acquired 

 for Kew. His interest in local history is shown, among other ways, 

 in the interesting account of his fellow townsman James Balbon 

 (t. 1799). which — under the title An Eighteenth Century Botanist 

 (1910) -he reprinted from a local newspaper. A full account of 

 Crossland and his work (with ])ortrait and bibliography up to date) is 

 published in the Naturalist foi- Oc'tobrr 1910, from which most of 

 the above information is taken. 



