57 
was educated and brought up in Lady Breadalbane’s Orphanage 
at Kenmore, and served his Tn hiomeegte in Taymouth Gardens. 
He came to Kew from Whittinghame in 1902, and in the following 
year was appointed peter Curator to take charge of the new 
Botanic sub-station at Tarkwa, in the western part of the Gold 
Coast Colony (K.B. 1903, p. 31). Two years later he was trans- 
ferred to the service of the Government of Southern Nigeria 
and was placed in charge of the Botanic Gardens at Old Calabar 
(K.B. 1905, p. 61). Mr. Don visited Kew in accordance with 
custom during his leaves of absence from the Colony, and in the 
spring of 1910 was permitted by the Secretary of State for the 
Colonies to visit the Colonial Museums at Hamburg and Haarlem. 
He had returned to England again on leave at the end of Septem- 
ber and had intended taking a course of Entomology at the London 
School of Tropical Medicine. He died very suddenly of acute 
pheumonia at Paythouth Canty Aberfeldy, Perthshire, in his 33rd 
year. 
West Indian Agricultural Conference, 1912.—An invitation was 
received at the end of October from the Commissioner of Agri- 
culture, West foie. for a representative of the Royal Botanic 
Gardens, Kew, to attend the West Indian Agricultural Conference 
to be held at Trinidad from January 23rd—30th, 1912. With the 
sanction of the President of the Board of cers and Fisheries, 
this invitation has been accepted, and the Assistant Director 
has been deputed to attend the conference as the representative 
Visitors during 1911.—3,704,606 visitors to the Royal Botanic 
Gardens have been recorded durin ring the year 1911. These figures 
show an increase of 158,304 over those of the previous year and are 
the largest on record. During the ten years 1901-10, 22,459,027 
persons have visited the gardens giving an average of 2 245, 902. 
The total number of visitors on Sundays, during 1911, was 1 517, 650 
and. on weekdays 2,186,956. 
The largely increased number of visitors during the past year 
must be attributed mainly to the remarkable spell of brilliant 
summer weather and also to the large ora’ of visitors to London 
in connection with the Coronation. As in 1910, there have been 
five Bank Holidays and the attendances on Easter Monday, Whit- 
Monday and the August Bank Holiday were 144,084, 157,425 and 
115,833 respectively. The total number of visitors for the five 
holidays was 446,644, as against 424,010 in 1910. 
Sunday visitors have decreased by 96,435, while the number of 
visitors on week days show an increase of. 254, 739 
‘The greatest attendance on any one day w as, 2 as has commonly 
been found to be the case, on Whit-Monday, when there were 4,971 
more visitors recorded than for the correspon nding day in the 
previous year which previously held the record for a single day. 
The smallest number on “ay oné day was 179 on December 20th. 
