OBITUARY. 91 



met with it in some numbers at Bloxworth in 1886, where the 

 Drosera grew in abundance. — H.J.T. 



Arthur Ernest Gibbs, F.L.S., F.Z.S., F.E.S., &c. 



In the death of of Mr. A. E. Gibbs, many of our societies have lost 

 a constant attendant, a frequent contributor to their proceedings, and 

 an indefatigable worker in all their various activities. He was a 

 Fellow of the Linnean, the Zoological, and the Entomological Societies, 

 of the last of which he had been on the Council for more than one 

 term and was a leading member of its business committee, where his 

 knowledge of printing had been of great assistance. At the time of his 

 death he was serving his second year of office as President of the Hert- 

 fordshire Natural Society, in which position he had succeeded Lord 

 Rothschild ; he was also a Vice-president of the South London 

 Entomological Society and would probably have become president in 

 due course, and he had been for some years on the Council of the Ray 

 Society. He was a member of the London Natural History Society, 

 and also a Fellow of the Royal Horticultural Society. 



Born in 1859 at St, Albans, Herts, where his ancestors for several 

 generations had been in business as large printers, he was always 

 keenly alive to anything which would benefit his native city. When a 

 county museum was suggested, he not only lent the columns of the 

 " Herts Advertiser," but advocated its establishment in season and out 

 of season, with the success his efforts deserved. His work did not end 

 there for when built he gave largely and induced others to give, 

 specimens for exhibition, often arranging them himself from a specially 

 educational point of view. His enthusiasm did not even end with this 

 matter of success, for only a few days before he passed away he 

 expressed his pleasure to the writer that he had lived to see the museum 

 building practically doubled in size largely through his work. It was 

 natural that his felloAV townsmen should recognise his valuable 

 assistance and we find him serving on all the important bodies of the 

 city, at one time or another, even having the civic chair offered to him. 

 The Bailding Society, the Gas Company, the Educational authorities 

 all claimed his services, and in the latter he did much useful work. 



His earlier study was devoted to the British Lepidoptera, of which 

 he possessed an excellent working collection, including some striking 

 aberrations, and recently questions of the distribution and local 

 disappearance of British species had occupied much of his attention. 

 His presidential address to the Herts N. H. Society dealt with these 

 last questions in the case of Paran/e ae(/eria. 



Another phase of his interest in the British species was that of the 

 records of his native county. For many years past in the Tranx. of 

 the Uertforchhire Nat. Hist. Soci/. summaries of recent occurrences 

 and discoveries of insects of all orders have appeared under his name 

 and that of his friend Mr. Barraud. In conjunction with the latter 

 gentleman, a very full annotated " List of Hertfordshire Diptera " was 

 published in these Transactions a few years ago. 



For many years Mr. Gibbs had spent his summer holidays on the 

 continent, and various out of the way places had been visited by him. 

 Although the higher regions of the Alps did not suit his health, he had 

 travelled and collected insects largely in Switzerland, the Vosgos 

 Mountains, the Eastern Pyrenees, Corsica and the Balkans, and on one 

 occasion he spent several weeks in Algeria. 



