432 Obituary— Prof. W. K. Parker. 



Indian shells, be collected, mounted, and carefully drew a vast 

 series of Foraminifera and other Microzoa. By the friendly advice 

 of Professors W. Crawford Williamson and T. Rupert Jones, he then 

 systematically treated the Foraminifera as a special study. One 

 of the first results was his paper "On the Miliolitidse of the East- 

 Indian Seas " (Trans. Microsc. Soc. n.s. vol. vi. 1858, pp. 53-59). 

 A joint paper on the Foraminifera of the Norwegian coast, published 

 in the Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. April, 1857, became the basis of a larger 

 memoir, on the Arctic and North- Atlantic Foraminifera, in the Phil. 

 Trans. 1865. A series of papers followed, on the Nomenclature of 

 the Foraminifera, explaining the real relationship of the hitherto 

 published genera and species, recent and fossil. These also, written 

 in conjunction with T. Rupert Jones, from 1859 to 1863, and 

 thence with H. B. Brady also, appeared in the same well-known 

 periodical until 1873. In the meantime notes and papers were 

 given by Parker and Jones on fossil Foraminifera from Auckland 

 (New Zealand), Mount Gambier (South Australia). Malaga (Spain), 

 Italy, Malta, Vienna, Baljik, etc., Chellaston (Rhaetic?), the Chalk 

 of Gravesend and Meudon, Mr. Eley's collection, the Creta- 

 ceous Eotalince, and, with Dr. H. B. Brady, the Foraminifera of the 

 Crag, and recent and fossil Polymoi-phincB, in various publications. 1 



Professor Parker's genius colours all these notes and papers ; his 

 wonderful power of analysing the characters of obscure organisms, 

 and of comparing and contrasting the manifold features and peculi- 

 arities so recognized, is traceable throughout. His great natural 

 talent of drawing aided much in the work of elucidating the relation 

 of the several specific forms and their manifold varieties. 



Together with A. d'Orbigny, A. E. von Reuss, and others, Prof. 

 Parker has done much (and to a large extent with greater exactitude) 

 towards making these Rhizopodal Microzoa known as to definite 

 morphological groups, and as to their exact distribution in various 

 geological series, — thus making them trustworthy guides in the 

 discrimination of strata, whether as to relative age, — of different 

 kinds of sedimentation, — or of various depths of deposition. 



Much as we grieve at the loss of so acute an observer and so good 

 a generalizer in one branch of natural science, other Naturalists feel 

 as deeply his loss as of a painstaking and philosophical biologist, 

 whose manifold researches and discoveries in vertebrate develop- 

 ment, published in upwards of thirty important memoirs in the 

 Transactions of the Royal, Linnean, Zoological, and other Societies, 

 have had, and still will have, wide-spread useful influences. Not 

 the less will a great circle of friends and relatives long mourn for a 

 great and good man, — an enthusiastic lover of Nature, who sought 

 for truth with simplicity of mind, zeal for accurate knowledge, and 

 kindly consideration for fellow- workers ; — an unselfish, upright, and 

 true Christian. 



1 See the Royal Society's " Catalogue of Scientific Papers," and Mr. C. D. 

 Sherborn's " Bibliography of the Foraminifera." 



