THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 19 



PROFESSOR SIR FREDERICK McCOY. 



It is with great regret we record the death on Saturday, 13th 

 May, 1899, at Brighton, of Sir Frederick McCoy, K.C.M.G., 

 M.A., D.Sc, F.R.S., &c.. Professor of Natural Science in the 

 University of Melbourne. 



The late professor was one of the original members of the Field 

 Naturalists' Club of Victoria, having been elected its first president 

 in May, 1880, and his presidental address, delivered at the first 

 conversazione oi the Club on 17th May, 1881, printed at length 

 in the Southern Science Record, vol. i., page 102, gives an interest- 

 ing resume of the first year's work of the Club, now entering its 

 twentieth year. He was re-elected president in 1881 and 1882, 

 and followed the then customary plan of giving an annual address 

 at the conversaziones in April, 1882, and April, 1883, in each of 

 which hints for future work for members of the Club were given 

 (see Southern Science Record, vol. ii., p 103, and vol. iii., p. 139). 

 He was succeeded in the presidential chair by the late Hon. Dr. 

 Dobson, and was subsequently elected an honorary member, and 

 afterwards, along with the late Baron Sir F. von Mueller, a patron 

 of the Club. His last function in connection with the Club was his 

 presence at the conversazione of May, 1896, when he proposed a 

 vote of thanks to his fellow patron, Baron von Mueller, for the 

 inaugural speech. 



Professor McCoy was educated at Dublin and Cambridge, 

 where he showed considerable ability in the sciences of geology 

 and palaeontology, and subsequently served on the geological 

 survey of Great Britain, and on the foundation of the University 

 of Melbourne, in 1854, he was selected to fill the chair of 

 Natural Science, which then embraced the subjects of zoology, 

 comparative anatomy, botany, mineralogy, chemistry, geology, 

 and palaeontology, but by the appointment of additional pro- 

 fessors and lecturers several of these subjects have since been 

 handed over to others. During later years the directorship of 

 the National Museum of Natural History and Geology occupied 

 a considerable portion of his time, and the regional groups of 

 animals, &c., there are fine examples of his method of pre- 

 senting the natural history of the world to the general public. 

 As an author his name will ever be connected with the first and 

 second volumes of the well-known " Prodromus of the Zoology 

 of Victoria," of which twenty parts, containing two hundred 

 .excellently coloured plates, were issued under his direction, and 

 which stamp him as a man of the front rank among systematic 

 zoologists. He also issued several parts of a " Prodromus of 

 the Palaeontology of Victoria," in which numbers of our fossils 

 are accurately described. Professor McCoy was the recipient of 

 many honours during his long life of 76 years, from his Queen, 

 his university, and from numerous scientific societies in many 

 parts of the world. 



