mei ty 
7 4 * > 
x OBITUARY 267 
whose lectures were accessible to those who chose 
to attend them. The occupants of these chairs, in 
Darwin’s time, were eminent men and also admir- 
able lecturers in their widely different styles. The 
horror of geological lectures which Darwin had 
acquired at Edinburgh, unfortunately prevented 
him from going within reach of the fervid elo- 
quence of Sedgwick ; but he attended the botanical 
course, and though he paid no serious attention to 
the subject, he took great delight in the country 
excursions, which Henslow so well knew how to 
make both pleasant and instructive. The 
Botanical Professor was, in fact, a man of rare 
character and singularly extensive acquirements 
in all branches of natural history. It was his 
greatest pleasure to place his stores of knowledge 
at the disposal of the young men who gathered 
about him, and who found in him, not merely an 
encyclopedic teacher but a wise counsellor, and, 
in case of worthiness, a warm friend. Darwin’s 
acquaintance with him soon ripened into-a friend- 
ship which was terminated only by Henslow’s 
death in 1861, when his quondam pupil gave 
touching expression to his sense of what he owed 
to one whom he calls (in one of his letters) his 
“dear old master in Natural History.” (II. p. 217.) 
It was by Henslow’s advice that. Darwin was led 
to break the vow he had registered against making 
an acquaintance with geology ; and it was through 
Henslow’s good offices with Sedgwick that he 
