Mr. William Head, a member of the gardening staff of the 
Royal Botanic Gardens, has been appointed by the Secretary of 
State for India in Council, on the recommendation of Kew, a 
probationer gardener for service in India. 
Mr. Rupert Badgery, a member of the gardening staff of 
the Royal Botanic Gardens, has been appointed by the Secretary 
of State for India in Council, on the recommendation of Kew, 
a probationer gardener for service in India. 
J. M. Crombie.— The Rev. James Morrison Crombie, F.L.S., 
was born at Aberdeen in 1831,* and was educated at Marischal 
College there, and at Edinburgh University, where he took his 
M.A., and was subsequently appointed a minister in the Estab- 
lished Church of Scotland. He was early attracted to natural 
history, and his first production was a small volume on Braemar 
inl86J. Five years later he came to London ami held various 
appointments till failing health in 1903 compelled him to give up 
bis latest post as Clerk to the Synod in England. He died at 
Ewhurst, Surrey, on 12th May, 1906. 
He was lecturer on Botany at St. Mary's Hospital from 1879 to 
1886, but the work by which he is beet known, was his work on 
Lichens; he determined the collections brought home by 
numerous travellers, and described them as parts of these series 
or as detach.. I |.ap.-rs in journals; he also drew up accounts of 
the Lichens in the herbaria of Dillenius and of Withering. He 
issued a brief account of British Lichens in 1870, and designed a 
fuller monograph with descriptions of the species in the British 
Mtweum, of which he only completed the first volume. He was 
thoron-hlv in accordance with his old friend Nylander in reject- 
ing the symbiotic theory of Lichens, and this strong prepossession 
coloured much of his writings. The Herbarium at Kew was 
indebted to him for the determination from time to time ot 
Lichens belonging to the collection. 
B. D. J. 
* The late Mr. Crombie has been stated by ins widow -to nave «*eii «- «« 
20th April, 1830, by himself to have been born in 1833. The latter date is 
urrect, the former is probably so. Professor Trail who *»****£ 
made the necese Pa mh Register 
of Mr. Crombie's birth ; the entry refers to his baptism and is as follows :- 
" Baptisms in Old Machar in 1831, April 20, 1831, John Crombie shi captain, 
"Huntly Street, and his spouse, Ann Morrison, had a son born na ™ e * ' am *f 
baptised by the Rev. Joseph Thorburn; witnesses J«»« "£ 
i rrison." Mr. Crombie attended the Arts Classes, Marischal College, 
Aberdeen, during the sessions 1847-48 and 1848-49. 
