26 THE BIRDS OF ESSEX. 



for many years, with satisfaction both to patients and governors of 

 the institution. He died on September 5, 1869, having retired 

 from practice for several years. In many respects he was a most 

 remarkable man. His knowledge of Natural History was very 

 extensive, and if it could be said that he excelled in any branch 

 especially, his life-long habit of observation and fondness for birds- 

 would have placed him in the first rank of ornithologists, had he 

 made public the vast store of facts he had accumulated, but unfor- 

 tunately he never published anything. This may have been due 

 to his retiring disposition, but one thing he did in perfection : his 

 stuffed birds were marvellously painstaking and truthful copies of 

 nature. He was brimful of facts, but these had always to be drawn 

 out of him by persistent questioning. He was by far the best natu- 

 ralist it was ever my lot to meet. Dr. Bell made public in the 

 Zoologist, I think, some of his observations on the hybernation of 

 caterpillars, especially on that of the White Admiral Butterfly. He 

 was also very successful in his treatment of birds in captivity, and 

 appeared to have no difficulty in keeping healthily in confinement 

 some of the most troublesome of the warblers ; his knowledge of 

 their habits and his patience enabling him to succeed where others 

 failed. 



" Although he never published anything, he was always pleased tO' 

 assist anyone requiring help, and many a young naturalist had to 

 thank him for having first led him into correct habits of observation. 

 He was an excellent botanist and an enthusiastic horticulturist and 

 florist. His experiments in the propagation of fruits and vegetables 

 were of great public importance, inasmuch as he raised varieties of peas, 

 which have enabled us to have Marrow-fat peas over a month sooner 

 than it was possible before he began his experiments. The same 

 may be said of the varieties of rhubarb he raised. The very earliest 

 and best kind grown, his Early Red, is still unsurpassed for flavour 

 and early fitness for the table. As a florist also, he was most success- 

 ful. Lovers of the pelargonium have to thank him for many valuable 

 varieties, he having raised the first white one known. In short, there 

 was nothing he touched which he did not excel in, and it was a 

 matter of general regret amongst his friends that he could not be 

 induced to put to paper anything out of his great accumulation of 

 facts and observations." * 



He was evidently an adept at netting birds, and in his letters to 

 Heysham (16) more than once speaks of his "spider nets." In one, 

 he says : — 



* For the foregoing notice of Dr. Maclean, I am indebted to the kindness of Dr. Laver. 



