224 Memoir of the late John Sutton Balfour. 



day of the excursion, the Club ascended Beinn Doireann, a 

 mountain on the confines of Argyleshire and Perthshire, 3523 

 feet high. This mountain is difficult to climb, but still more 

 difficult to descend. During our descent the Professor slipt on 

 some loose stones and fell on his head, which was cut, and he 

 was badly shaken. He managed, however, to walk back to our 

 hotel. He slept badly during the night, and the next morning 

 left for Edinburgh in company of one of the party. Those of us 

 who were present will not soon forget the expression of the 

 venerable Professor's consternation as he (I believe for the first 

 time) had to succumb. 



Whether or not the injuries he received on Beinn Doireann, 

 and the great shock to his nervous system, were of a permanent 

 character it is difficult to say ; but certain it is, from this time 

 dates his serious illness. He was never afterwards the same, 

 and had on several occasions to be assisted in his class-work by 

 his son Professor Bayley Balfour, who lectured for his father 

 for two sessions. 



In 1879 he retired from the chair of Botany, which he had 

 held for 34 years, and had filled with so much honour to the 

 University, and so much advantage to Botanical science. He 

 was entitled to his well-earned retirement ; but during the remain- 

 ing years of his life his health was very feeble, and consequently 

 he did not enjoy his cessation from labour as much as his friends 

 could have wished. On Monday 11th Feb. 1884, he died quietly 

 at Inverleith House, the residence of the Eegius Keeper of the 

 Eoyal Botanical Gardens, and where the later years of his life 

 had been spent. 



The following extract from the minutes of the Scottish Alpine 

 Botanical Club gives an excellent view of the late Professor : — 



" He carried on the work of the chair of Botany with extraordinary 

 vigour and success, and by his writings. and labours did much to advance 

 the progress of Botanical science. He applied himself with great 

 enthusiasm to the investigation of the Botanical resources of his native 

 land, and made Field Botany an important point of the work of his life. 

 No man knew the flora of Scotland so well as he, and no one has done so 

 much to extend our knowledge of the habits and localities of Scottish 

 Alpine plants. The rambles among the Scottish hills which he annually 

 conducted are remembered asjbright spots in the lives of thousands of his 

 pupils, and his more immediate friends recall with delight the many happy 

 days spent in his society and under his leadership among the lonely and 

 romantic scenes of the Scottish Highlands. Xone knew him better or 



