{Authors are responsible for nomenclature used.) 



The Scottish NaturaHst 



Nos. 131 AND 132.] 1922 [Nov.-Dec. 



WILLIAM EVANS, F.R.S.E., etc. 

 1851-1922. 



There are two questions which inevitably arise and demand 

 an answer in an attempt to understand the life-work of 

 any man. The first and simplest deals with effect ; it is 

 the obvious question asked by all — What did he accomplish ? 

 The second is more elusive and more fundamental ; it is 

 a question of cause — What influences guided and determined 

 his accomplishment? 



For the moment, no more need be said regarding the 

 accomplishment of William Evans than that he was perhaps 

 the most competent Scottish field naturalist of his day, 

 a man whose sympathies ranged over the whole field of 

 wild life, and whose knowledge was equally precise concern- 

 ing the animals and the plants of the countryside, from the 

 lowest to the highest orders. Following the due order of 

 cause and effect, I shall first endeavour to indicate the 

 influences which seem to have determined the course of 

 his life-work. 



If it be true that naturalists are born and not made 

 (and there is much truth in the statement, if naturalists 

 be looked upon as distinct from zoology specialists, who 

 may be manufactured), then William Evans was a shining 

 example of the truth ; for the stamp of heredity is clear 

 in his work. His father, William Wilson Evans, was Curator 

 of the Experim.ental Gardens in Inverleith Row, Edinburgh, 

 which were subsequently absorbed in the Royal Botanic 

 131 AND 132 X 



