262 HARRY MARSHALL WARD 



It contains much that could not easily be dealt with in any- 

 other way. 



It was soon apparent that we had got hold of a man of ex- 

 ceptional ability. It must be confessed that the atmosphere 

 was stimulating, and the conditions under which the teaching 

 was carried on necessitated its being given at high pressure. 

 I remember that on one occasion Ward fainted at his work, 

 from no other cause, I think, than over-excitement. In the 

 autumn of the same year he went for one session to Owens 

 College, Manchester, with the object of continuing his general 

 education. I learn that he carried off the prizes in every subject 

 that he took up. 



In the succeeding year I was glad to avail myself of the 

 assistance of Ward as demonstrator in a subsequent course at 

 South Kensington, which I undertook with Prof Vines. Later 

 in the year he became a candidate for and secured an open 

 scholarship at Christ's College, where Vines himself was then a 

 Fellow, and went into residence in October, 1876. 



Ward took full advantage of his opportunities at Cambridge, 

 and attended the teaching of Sir Michael Foster in physiology 

 and of Prof F. M. Balfour in comparative anatomy. The sound 

 and fundamental conceptions which he acquired from the former 

 manifestly influenced his work throughout life. He took a first 

 class in botany in the Natural Science Tripos in 1879. His 

 first published paper was the result of work in the same year in 

 the Jodrell Laboratory at Kew. In this, which was published 

 in the Proceedings of the Linnean Society, he seriously criticised 

 and corrected that of Vesque on the embryo-sac of Phanerogams. 



As was customary with our young botanists. Ward went to 

 Germany for a short time, for purposes of study and to strengthen 

 his knowledge of the language. He worked at Wiirzburg with 

 Sachs, whose lectures on the physiology of plants he afterwards 

 translated in 1887. There he continued his study of the embryo- 

 sac in Orchideae, as Sachs subsequently testified, " zu meiner 

 vollsten Zufriedenheit." 



Before the end of the year Ward was appointed on the 

 recommendation of Kew to proceed to Ceylon for two years as 

 Government Cryptogamist to investigate the leaf-disease in 



