300 THE EDINBURGH PROFESSORS 



museum to which old pupils all over the world contributed 

 was instituted, and the Garden itself trebled in size, the latest 

 addition, made just before his retirement, being an area to be 

 cultivated as an arboretum for students of Forestry a subject 

 then beginning to claim attention. 



With Balfour's retirement in 1879 the link of Botany with 

 Medicine in the University was still further weakened. Medicine 

 was left out of the title of the Chair to which Alexander 

 Dickson succeeded. 



Alexander Dickson of Hartree and Kilbucho was born at 

 Edinburgh, 21st July, 1836. He was the second son of David 

 Dickson of Hartree in Peeblesshire, and the representative of 

 a family for long lairds of the estates of which, by the early 

 death of his elder brother, he became proprietor. Educated 

 privately, he entered the University of Edinburgh as a student 

 of Medicine, graduating in i860. Before graduation he had 

 studied in Wurzburg and in Berlin, particularly under Kolliker 

 and Virchow, and after it he embarked on the stream of medical 

 practice in Edinburgh. But that was convention a demonstra- 

 tion of brass plate. His means placed him beyond the necessity 

 of such professional work. His instinct lay in the direction of 

 discovery of method more than in its application. During his 

 student days he had shown a keen interest in Botany. Before 

 graduation he had written on botanical subjects, and his thesis 

 on graduation " The development of the flower in Caryo- 

 phyllaceae " witnesses to his obsession. Whilst waiting for 

 patients, he had continued work on embryogeny in plants, and 

 when in 1862 the ill health of Professor Dickie at Aberdeen 

 required the appointment of a substitute, the selection of Dickson 

 set seal to his claims as a professed Botanist. In 1866 he 

 succeeded Harvey as Professor in Dublin. Thence in 1868 he 

 was translated to Glasgow as successor to Walker Arnott, and 

 in 1879 became Professor of Botany and Queen's Botanist in 

 Edinburgh on the retirement of Balfour, and, holding these 

 positions, he died in 1887. 



Dickson's passion was not teaching, and his success is 

 testimony to the quality of the man. He was adored by his 

 students, as could not well be otherwise with a man of his 



