January 6, 1898] 



NA TORE 



227 



was desirable, and in Huxley's that it was not. Again 

 and ayain did Parker appeal in vain, until at last, on the 

 morning of October 2, 1878, he triumphed. Dyer and 

 Vines were Parker's more immediate associates in the 

 early work of development of the Huxleian laboratorj'- 

 system ; and arhong the persons who studied under him as 

 it progressed now occupying prominent positions in the 

 biological world, may be named F. E. Beddard, A. G. 

 Bourne, G. C. Crick, J. J. Fletcher, Patrick Geddes, 

 Angelo Heilprin, C. H. Hurst, C. Lloyd-Morgan, Daniel 

 Morris, R. D. Oldham, H. F. Osborn, W. B. Scott, T. 

 W. Shore, Oldfield Thomas, and H. Marshall Ward. 

 Parker's first paper (" On the Stomach of the Fresh-Water 

 Crayfish ") and his first book ("Zootomy") were alike a 

 direct outcome of the undertaking, and the scheme for 

 his " Lessons in Elementary Biology," formulated while 

 still he was in London, was similarly begotten of his ex- 

 perience during its development, which oft formed the 

 topic of conversation as he and I in the late '70's sat 

 working side by side. Nor must it be forgotten that 

 Parker rendered Huxley commendable aid in the produc- 

 tion of his wonderful book on " The Crayfish." I venture 

 to* think that in recognition of all this Parker has 

 established a claim to distinction in connection with the 

 educational work of his great master second to that of 

 none other ; and when it is remembered that the un- 

 paralleled activity among botanists and zoologists during 

 the last two decades has rendered it impossible for one 

 man to efficiently teach the two subjects from a professorial 

 chair, in the manner originally laid down under the Hux- 

 leian dispensation, Parker's name will occupy a unique 

 position in the history of this, as that of the only man 

 prominently associated with its inception who taught 

 both subjects to the end of his career. 



To the task of founding the Huxleian teaching- 

 collection, moreover, is due Parker's interest in the work 

 of the preparator, which led to his being the first person 

 to successfully prepare and mount in a condition fit for 

 prolonged display cartilaginous skeletons in a dry state. 

 Under Parkers curatorship the Otago University 

 Museum advanced by leaps and bounds, and while to his 

 reputation as a teacher and investigator he thus added 

 distinction as a conservator and administrator in 

 zoology, he attained also a reputation in botany both as 

 a manipulator and discoverer. He came upon the 

 botanical platform at the time when Alfred Bennett and 

 Dyer were at work upon the English translation of the 

 third edition of Sachs's monumental " Lehrbuch der 

 Botanik," and when the methods of that great man, 

 already introduced into Britain by McNab, were by these 

 botanists and their associates becoming established. 

 For Parker, however, carrot-drill had little charm, while to 

 his aesthetic nature glycerine and gold-size were messy 

 and distasteful. He was at the time repeating the work 

 of Nicholas Kleinenberg on Hydra, busy with osmic acid 

 and cocoa-butter, and the well-known results of his labours 

 led him to apply the method to the treatment of plant 

 tissues, with the result that through a short paper com- 

 municated to the Royal Microscopical Society in March 

 1879, he ranks as one of the first to apply the modern dry 

 methods*of micro-chemical technique to vegetable histo- 

 logy. As a discoverer in botany he will remain memor- 

 able for having first directed attention to the existence of 

 sieve-tubes in the marine algee {Macrocystis) in a short 

 communication to the Transactions of the New Zealand 

 Institute for 1881. 



Truly is his a great record, worthy his noble character 

 and his association with a Huxley I but while the world 

 will cherish his memory for that which he achieved, those 

 who knew him feel that by his death something more 

 than a link with the historic past has gone, and that they 

 have lost a true friend, a noble man, an example. In the 

 autumn of 1892 Parker came home on a visit. Soon after 

 his return his wife died, and this event probably helped 



NO. 147 1, VOL. 57] 



to bring on an illness which showed itself formidably 

 about two years ago. Recurrent attacks of influenza, 

 the last of which rendered him prostrate for three- 

 months, told severely upon his health and strength ; 

 but despite all, following the example of his beloved 

 father, he worked on whenever he could, patient under 

 sufifering and affliction the like of which has killed 

 many a man, beautiful in his unselfishness and lack of 

 ostentation, loving, and sympathetic. On October 26 last, 

 he had recovered sufficiently to start on a journey of some 

 forty miles to visit a friend at Shag Valley, in company 

 with his eldest sister, who for several years had lovingly 

 shared his anxieties and administered to the needs of his 

 three boys. While half-way onwards he became so prostrate 

 that a halt was necessary, his friends deeming it advisable 

 to take him towards home again. He reached only as far 

 as Warrington, where he became weaker and comatose, 

 and passed peaceable away on Sunday, November 7, at one 

 a.m. He was buried there two days later, in the presence 

 of sorrowing friends, a few among the many by whom he 

 was universally beloved. G. B. Howes. 



NOTES. 



Few men of science appear in the list of New Year honours. 

 The honour of Knighthood has been conferred upon Prof 

 George Brown, C.B. , Consulting Veterinary Surgeon to the 

 Board of Agriculture ; Mr. Ernest Clarke, Secretary to the 

 Royal Agricultural Society ; Dr. John Struthers, late President 

 of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh ; and Dr. Johr^ 

 Hatty Tuke, President of the Royal College of Physicians of 

 Edinburgh. Prof. Gardiner, Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, 

 Glasgow University, has been promoted to be Knight Com- 

 mander of the Order of the Bath (K.C.B.), and Prof. D'Arcy 

 Thompson, British delegate at the recent Conference on the 

 Bering Sea Fisheries, has been appointed a Companion of the 

 same Order (C.B.). Mr. James Dredge, one of the editors ot 

 Engineering, has been made a Companion of the Order of St. 

 Michael and St. George (C.M.G.), for services in connection 

 with the Brussels Exhibition ; and Major R. H. Brown, of the 

 Egyptian Irrigation Department, has been given the same 

 honour. 



Mr. Alexander Agassiz, as we learn from his recently issued 

 report on the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard 

 College, U.S.A., for the past year, has planned to pass the greater 

 part of the present winter in studying the coral reefs of the Fiji 

 Islands. He will be accompanied by Dr. Woodworth and Dr. 

 Mayer as assistants. The steamer Yaralla has been char- 

 tered in Sydney for the expedition. In addition to the usual 

 apparatus, for photographic purposes, for sounding and dredging, 

 and for pelagic work, Prof. Agassiz takes with him a com- 

 plete diamond-drill outfit, and hopes to find a suitable locality 

 for boring on the rim of one of the atolls of the Fijis. The 

 boring machinery will be in charge of an expert sent by the 

 Sullivan Machine Company, from whom the machinery is 

 obtained. The Directors of the Bache Fund have made a 

 large grant towards the expenses of this boring experiment. 



The Sydney meeting of the Australasian Association for the 

 Advancement of Science opens to day, under the presidency of 

 Prof. A. Liversidge, F. R.S. A large number of papers are 

 down for reading before the various sections, and we hope to 

 give some account of them later. The evening lectures are by 

 Prof. W. Baldwin Spencer, on "The Centre of Australia"; 

 Sir James Hector, K.C.M.G., F.R.S., on "Antarctica and the 

 Islands of the Far South " ; and Prof. R. Threlfall and Mr. 

 J. A. Pollock, on " Electric Signalling without Wires." 



We regret to announce the death of Major-General Edward 

 Mounier Boxer, F.R.S., for many years Superintendent of the 



