degree of Doctor of Laws was conferred on him by Trinity College, 

 Dublin, in 1857." 



This brief notice of one who was for twenty-seven years an honour to 

 the Society, may be fittingly closed with a few words of affectionate testi- 

 mony by a brother officer, to whose Memoir we are indebted for much of 

 the foregoing. " The characteristics which shone forth in Portlock 

 during his well-spent life," writes Major-General Sir Thomas Larcom, 

 "whether as a soldier, a geographer, or a geologist, were undaunted 

 courage in facing difficulties, Spartan endurance and invincible perse- 

 verance in overcoming them. Endowed, when in the zenith of his career, 

 with a frame and nerves of iron, he exhibited such a vast power of con- 

 tinuous labour, that he achieved every object he had in view ; while great 

 ability, and a pure love of knowledge, were in him guided and governed by 

 the highest sense of honour and moral rectitude." 



Dr. ARCHIBALD ROBERTSON was born at Cockburnspath in Scotland, 

 on the 3rd of December, 1 789. He studied medicine at Edinburgh, and in 

 1808 entered the Naval Medical Service. After some years of active 

 employment in Europe arid America, he on the termination of the war 

 resorted again to Edinburgh for the further prosecution of study, and took 

 his degree of M.D. in that University in 1817. He then settled as a 

 physician in Northampton ; and although for more than a twelvemonth 

 he did not receive the encouragement of a single fee, he held on to the 

 position he had taken, and was soon rewarded by large and lucrative 

 employment, his success being promoted and assured by his being in 1820 

 elected Physician to the Northampton Infirmary. After a long and pros- 

 perous professional career, and the acquisition of a handsome independence 

 honourably earned, he in 1853 resolved to withdraw himself from the 

 labour of active practice. He accordingly left Northampton, and passed 

 the rest of his life in retirement in the west of England. 



Dr. Robertson was a man of considerable literary accomplishment, and, 

 before his time became engrossed by practice, he was in the habit of writing 

 literary articles in some of the journals and reviews of the day. He con- 

 tributed two short articles on professional subjects to Forbes's 'Cyclopaedia 

 of Medicine.' He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society on the 

 llth of February, 1836. 



Both as a physician and as a member of society, Dr. Robertson was 

 highly esteemed. His death took place at Clifton, on the 1 9th of October, 

 1864. 



GIOVANNI ANTONIO AMEDEO PLANA, descended from an ancient and 

 distinguished family of Guarene in Piedmont, was born at Voghera, on the 

 8th of November, 1781. In 1800 he entered the Polytechnic School of 

 Paris, where he so greatly distinguished himself that, on the 23rd of May, 

 1803, he was appointed Professor in the Artillery School of Alessandria. 



