2 OBITUARY. 



impossible to provide a salary he must really come without one. 

 Fortunately, at this moment, Magdalen College began to place an 

 annual grant at the disposal of the University for the provision of 

 extra assistance in the departments, and it thus became possible to 

 appoint an assistant-curatorship, with a small income, augmented 

 later on from the Common University Fund. Shelford accepted 

 this position, and entered into residence at Oxford in the autumn 

 term of 1905. After leaving Kuching, and before returning home by 

 way of Japan, Vancouver, and the United States, he spent several 

 months travelling in the Malay Archipelago. On June 25th, 1908, 

 he married Audrey Gurney, daughter of the Kev. Alfred Kichardson, 

 vicar of Combe Down, Bath. 



Until his long illness, which began in April, 1909, Shelford's work 

 in Oxford was continued uninterruptedly and with the greatest energy. 

 He at once undertook the study of the large collection of Orthoptera 

 in the Hope Department, beginning with the Blattidce, which he 

 brought into a highly efficient state. In the course of his work upon 

 this group he determined and described, in a long series of valuable 

 memoirs, the new species in all the great Continental collections, 

 with the result that the Hope Department now contains by far the 

 finest collection of Blattidce in the world, and includes types or 

 co-types of a large proportion of all the known species. He had also 

 begun to work at the other Orthopterous groups, especially the 

 PJiasmidce and Mantidce, and, through his influence, the Tetrigina 

 (Acridiidce) were worked out by Dr. J. L. Hancock, of Chicago, and 

 Gryllacris by Dr. Achille Griffini, of Genoa. He was an indefatigable 

 worker, as will be realized by any naturalist who sees what the 

 Oxford collection of Blattidce became after only four years' work. 

 A too brief respite in the course of his illness enabled him to return 

 for a time and carry on the old work, and, up to the end of 1911, he 

 was still able to help the Department in many ways, and also to 

 begin a Natural History of Borneo. It is very much to be hoped that 

 this work, though incomplete, may be published at no distant date. 

 It is sure to be full of observations of the greatost interest to 

 naturalists of all kinds. 



When three years old Shelford contracted tubercular disease 

 of the hip-joint, as a result of a fall downstairs, and was condemned 

 to spend many years on his back. A severe operation was performed 

 when he was ten, and at thirteen he was able to leave home and 

 reside with a tutor. He was left with a stiff joint, and from time to 

 time suffered greatly from sciatica. During his residence in Sarawak 



