OBITUARY. 
JAMES HECTOR, 1834-1907. 
Taer time that has elapsed between the death of the principal founder of 
the New Zealand Institute, and the publication in the Transactions of the 
Institute of this appreciation of his work makes it clear that, in the 
perspective of the years, instead of sinking he rises in his position among 
great scientifie workers 
ames Hector was born Edinburgh on the 16th March, 1834. His 
father was a conveyancer of | note and Writer to the Signet, a friend of 
Sir Walter Scott, for whom he was wont to transcribe and translate old 
manuscripts. His mother was a niece of Dr. Barclay, founder of the 
Royal College of Surgeons' Museum, Edinburgh, and the teacher of Owen, 
Knox, Ballingall, Campbell, and a host of other surgeons and anatomists 
of renown. 
Hector received his early training at the Edinburgh Academy and High 
School. At fourteen he entered his father’s office, which he left on being 
articled to an actuary, with whom he stayed three years, at the same time 
attending classes at the University and School of Arts. Quite early he 
manifested a strong inclination towards chemistry and natural science. 
In November, 1852, he gave up all office-work and matriculated at 
Edinburgh University as a medical student, the medical course then offering 
the only avenue to scientific study. So it was with Owen, Huxley, and 
Medical student though - was, and earnest as a student 
England, or in Ireland. The resourcefulness that he developed, the habit 
of quick and aceurate observation, the general value of his student work, 
attracted the attention of his teachers. While attending Balfour's classes 
in botany he was selected by his professor to give to the Botanical Society 
an account of the geological and physical е of the ground gone - 
in excursions. There being no Chair of Geology in the university, h 
attended extra-academic lectures on geology, pipi ue and palacomialogy 
delivered by Macadam, Rose, and Page. He took the degree o 
1856. It is interesting to note that he handed in a graduation thesis on 
* The Antiquity of Man,” the title chosen by Lyell in 1863 for one of his 
famous books. 
