OBITUARY : DR. WALTER GEORGE RIDEWOOD, P.L.S. • 69 



He was educated at Enfield Grammar School, of which his father 

 was head master. From 1883 to 1887 he studied at the Koyal 

 College of Science, becoming an Associate and taking first classes in 

 both Biology and Greology. In 1888 he took his B.Sc. degree in the 

 University of London, with first-class honours in Zoology, and in 

 1897 became D.Sc. Meantime, in May, 1888, he had been appointed 

 Assistant to the Director at the British Museum (Natural History), 

 a post from which he retired in 1917 to the great regret of all his 

 friends. There he was employed in making the wonderful series of 

 anatomical preparations exhibited in the Central Hall of that 

 institution, a kind of work in which he was without rival. He also 

 organized and prepared several special exhibitions. 



In addition to, and for the most part as the result of his work in 

 the Museum, Dr. Ridewood published a long series of valuable 

 memoirs, chiefly dealing with the Vertebrata. His most important 

 paper relating to the Tnvertebrata was the " Monograph on the Grills 

 of the Lamellibranchia " (Phil. Trans., Ser. b, vol. cxov, 1903, 

 pp. 147-284). Of this he gave a resume (illustrated by lantern slides) 

 to our Society on 11th March, 1904. His other contribution to our 

 meetings was in May, 1908, when he exhibited and commented on 

 two specimens of " Phoenicurus ", the separated cerata of 

 Nudib ranch Mollusca {Tethys or Melihe), from Ceylon and Jaj)an 

 (Proc. Malac. Soc, viii, 1908, pp. 121-122). 



Ridewood "Was for twenty-three years Lecturer on Biology in the 

 Medical School of St. Mary's Hospital, London, and was Reader in 

 Zoology in the University of London. He was a Life Member of the 

 Limiean, Geological, and Zoological Societies, besides ours. During 

 the war he drove a Red Cross ambulance in France for nearly two 

 years. 



A man of singularly quiet and retiring disposition, whose hobby 

 was music, he being an extremely good player on the flute, Ridewood 

 was gifted with a spirit of genuine kindliness, which often showed 

 itself in the great amount of trouble he would take to help anyone 

 who asked for his advice and assistance. Hence his sudden and 

 tragic end on 19th September last came as a great shock to his 

 numerous friends, to whom his useful and brilliant career had seemed 

 far from nearing its close. 



[For further details see " Nature ", 29th September, 1921, p. 160, 

 to which obituary notice we are largely indebted for the foregoing 

 facts.] 



B. B. W. 



