174 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



OBITUARY. 



The Late James Kay. 



By the death of Mr James Kay, who passed peacefully 

 away on the 3rd of April last at the age of eighty-two years, 

 the Society has lost one of its oldest and, for many years, 

 one of its most active members. Mr Kay joined the Society 

 in 1867, and therefore had completed the fiftieth year of 

 his membership. On the occasion of the Jubilee Anniversary, 

 in 1904, six members of the Society were elected honorary 

 members "in consideration of their services to Forestry 

 in Scotland, and in honour of the Society's Jubilee," and, 

 along with the late Mr John Grant Thomson and the late 

 Mr D. F. Mackenzie, Mr Kay was selected for the honour 

 from among the practical forester members. On the honorary 

 members elected on that occasion, however, the hand of death 

 has been laid heavily, and it is sad to relate that, by the passing 

 away of Mr Kay, Professor Somerville is left the sole survivor of 

 the group. 



Mr Kay was born on the Duke of Hamilton's estate, in 

 Lanarkshire, on 21st March 1836, and he received his early 

 training in forestry there. He afterwards became forester 

 on the Lee and Carnwath estates of the late Sir Norman 

 Lockhart, Bart., in the same county. Leaving Lee, after five 

 years' service, with a very excellent testimonial from the then 

 resident factor, Mr John Hosack, he entered the employment of 

 the late Marquis of Bute as head forester in 1864, in succession 

 to the late Mr Thomson, and for forty-seven years he had the 

 management of the woods in Bute and the neighbouring 

 island of Cumbrae. He retired from active service in the end 

 of 1 910, and as he continued, with Lord Bute's permission, to 

 reside at Barone in his retirement, he occupied the same dwelling 

 for over half a century. 



In the earlier years of his membership, Mr Kay contributed a 

 number of articles to the Tra?isactions of the Society. These 

 include papers on" Beech and Thorn Hedges" (Vol. iv. p. 187), 

 "Wire-fencing with Wrought-Iron Standards in Stone" (Vol. v. 

 p. 79), " Register for Foresters" (Vol. v. p. 155), "Geology and 

 Arboriculture of Bute " (Vol. vii. p. 60), " Old and Remarkable 



