274 BRITISH BIRDS. 



seemed to be in his usual health and. cheerful mood. 

 Next day he took to his bed, pneumonia and other 

 complications supervened, and the end came early on the 

 morning of the 25th. 



By his death the Zoological Department of the British 

 Museum has lost a remarkable personality and a dis- 

 tinguished member of its staff, whose kindness of heart 

 and genial nature had endeared him to all his colleagues. 

 Those of us who knew him intimately have lost a dear 

 friend and cheerful companion, whom we shall long miss 

 from our midst. His exuberance of spirits and in- 

 exhaustible fund of humour, which found vent even 

 a few hours before his death, have enlivened many an 

 hour passed in his company, for even the most melancholy 

 of his friends could not feel dull in the cheering presence 

 of the late Head of the Bird Room. But to a wider 

 circle of working ornithologists, both at home and abroad, 

 the death of Dr. Sharpe means the loss of a much respected 

 and esteemed fellow-worker, who for well nigh forty years 

 occupied a prominent position in their ranks, and who 

 was ever most kind to those seeking his help, and in 

 imparting information to his brother ornithologists less 

 learned than himself. 



Richard Bowdler Sharpe was born in London on the 

 22nd of November, 1847. He was the eldest son of 

 Thomas Bowdler Sharpe, and grandson of the Revd. 

 Lancelot Sharpe, Rector of All Hallows Staining in the 

 City, and for many years Headmaster of St. Saviour's 

 Grammar School in Southwark. Thomas Bowdler Sharpe, 

 the father of the subject of this memoir, was a publisher 

 in Skinner Street, Snow Hill, publishing among other 

 things Sharpe's " London Magazine." But, fortunately, 

 the boy was not brought up in London. At the age of 

 six he was placed under the care of his aunt, Mrs. Magdalen 

 Wallace, widow of the Revd. J. Wallace, Headmaster of 

 the Grammar School at Sevenoaks. This lady, who was 

 a good Latin and Greek scholar, kept a preparatory 

 school at Brighton, where young Richard passed three 



