OBITUARY NOTICE— REV. JAMES FARQUHARSON 367 



never achieved extensive reputation as a preacher. Essentially 

 of the Evangelical school, he was perhaps too much dominated 

 by the Calvinistic aspect of theology to achieve pulpit popu- 

 larity in these modern days. Not that he lacked either 

 breadth of mind or tenderness of heart, but rather that in 

 the fight between native charity and acquired "divinity" he 

 felt it his duty to let the side he believed to be logical have 

 the best of it. His belief in the dread consequences of 

 depravity or heterodoxy only added pathos to his appeals 

 that his hearers should stand in the old ways, and so find 

 salvation. His theology never narrowed his sympathies, and 

 on the occasion of the Scott Centenary he delivered a speech 

 described by no meaner judge than Mr Russell of the Scotsman 

 as one of the finest evoked by the occasion. He had in 

 fact considerable literary gifts, and those who best knew him 

 were most gratified when, in 1887, his Alma Mater conferred 

 on him the degree of Doctor of Divinity. With a certain 

 wiriness of frame, Dr Farquharson had all his life a slight 

 weakness of constitution which developed into chronic bron- 

 chitis. After a most gallant fight, he had to confess himself 

 beaten, and to give up the active labours of his ministry. 

 In 1899 he retired to Edinburgh, the Rev. George Lawson 

 being appointed his assistant and successor. 



It used to be said by old friends who knew him in his 

 early manhood that Dr Farquharson's true vocation was 

 Natural History. While but a boy he joined with enthusiasm 

 in the pursuits of his father, who contributed various papers 

 to the " Royal Society Transactions " on Meteorology, Natural 

 History, and kindred subjects ; and he had the good luck to 

 find in his schoolmaster, the Rev. John Minto, M.A., another 

 notable and keen botanist. It is not astonishing that at 

 College his chief success was in the domain of Natural History. 

 Professor Macgillivi^ay, having fallen into bad health in 1851, 

 selected young Farquharson to conduct his class for him, a 

 choice ratified by the Senatus, although the tutor was only 

 in his twentieth year. He continued to act as the Professor's 

 substitute during all the session of 1851-2; and, when Dr 

 Macgillivray died, he undertook charge of the class during 

 1852-3 at the special request of the Senatus — a high tribute 



