( 559 ) 



EDITORIAL GLEANINGS. 



We recently (ante, p. 478) drew attention to the forthcoming publication 

 of a series of volumes on the Fauna of South Africa, and mentioned that 

 the first volume would be on the Birds, and written by Dr. Stark. News has 

 unfortunately just been received of the violent death of Dr. Stark, caused by 

 a shell at Ladysmith during the Boer bombardment of that British town. 

 Dr. Stark was the eldest son of the late Mr. John Cowell Stark, of Torquay. 

 He was educated at Blundell's School, Tiverton, and at Clifton College, 

 with a view to becoming a civil engineer. Comparatively late in life, how- 

 ever, he determined to become a doctor, and he matriculated at Edinburgh 

 University. For ten or a dozen years he had been prominently identified 

 with life in South Africa. He had a practice at Capetown, and he was well 

 known and respected at the Cape and in Natal. The deceased gentleman 

 had travelled extensively, not only in South Africa, but in Spain, Morocco, 

 Turkey, and other countries. He was an ardent naturalist and^accom- 

 plished ornithologist, and possessed a splendid collection of birds of prey. 

 Dr. Stark was recently in England, and only returned to South Africa last 

 September. Whilst he was at Durban war was declared, when he volun- 

 teered for service in assisting the wounded, and was placed in charge of an 

 ambulance. 



A well-known and highly respected officer will be missed from the 

 entomological library of the British Museum in the person of Mr. John 

 Saunders, who has been connected with that establishment for nearly sixty 

 years. In 1840, Dr. J. E. Gray applied to the schoolmaster at Hounslow 

 for a boy who could " write a good plain hand," and young Saunders, 

 though barely thirteen years of age, was nominated for the post, and entered 

 on his duties in September of that year. The British Museum — then Old 

 Montagu House — much impressed the young assistant by the fine old 

 entrance-gate with its massive iron knocker, and on each side of the gate 

 a sentry-box and a grenadier with fixed bayonet. There was also a gate- 

 porter to open and shut the gate during the day, and three watchmen on 

 duty during the night, who alternately every hour from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. 

 walked round with club and lantern, and called the hour, " All's well." His 

 first occupation was in assisting Dr. Gray in soaking off the Mollusca from 

 old tablets of a very miscellaneous size, and placing them on new ones, 

 previously to their being properly named. In 1847 he was appointed to 



