vi Obituary Notices of Fellows deceased. 



In a collective enterprise, where action and action interact, it is difficult to 

 assign to individuals their respective measures of effect. But it is certain 

 that to Boyce, as much as to any one person, the University movement in 

 Liverpool owed success. After the actual institution of the University his 

 labours for it still continued, multiplying rather than abating. Four endowed 

 Chairs have owed creation largely to him, the Chairs of Bio-Chemistry, of 

 Tropical Medicine, of Comparative Pathology, and of Medical Entomology, as 

 well as the University Lectureship on Tropical Medicine. 



In the meanwhile his position and experience as a bacteriologist led to his 

 engagement on work of national scope. He was appointed a member of the 

 Eoyal Commission on Sewage Disposal. Much of the research executed for 

 this Commission was done in his laboratory, with the assistance of Dr. (now 

 Professor) A. S. F. Griinbaum and Drs. Harriette Chick, Hill, and MacConkey. 

 Later, in 1904, he became a member of the Eoyal Commission on Tuber- 

 culosis. On the day of his death he was to have given his signature to the 

 final Eeport of that Commission. 



In 1897 Boyce visited Canada with the British Association. He was 

 a secretary to the section of Physiology. The meeting was at Toronto. 

 This visit made a lasting impression on him. Closer union of the Dominion 

 with the old country by ties of mutual help and understanding became with 

 him a cherished ideal, and, as usual, he was not idle in regard to it. By his 

 advice, Mr. William Johnston, of Liverpool, instituted a Fellowship in the 

 University for young medical graduates from parts of the Empire outside the 

 Three Kingdoms. The steady success of the occupants of this Fellowship, 

 eoming into the University from Canada and elsewhere, was an abiding 

 pleasure to Boyce in all his after years. 



His ardour for Imperial development found congenial application later 

 when a letter reached the Faculty of Medicine from Mr. Chamberlain, 

 then Colonial Secretary. The letter rehearsed the heavy toll on life and 

 health taken by trade with the Tropics, a trade with which Liverpool as a 

 port is deeply concerned. The letter urged that the School of Medicine at 

 Liverpool might well establish a department devoted to the special study of 

 tropical disease. It is no secret that at first the suggestion was not well 

 received by the Faculty. Some regarded it as a rather presumptuous piece of 

 official interference : already, a whole hour's lecture in the systematic course 

 on medicine was entirely devoted to malaria. But Boyce's mind caught fire 

 from the new proposal. He would do it himself if the Faculty would not. He 

 would set apart rooms of his own, and, if need be, himself raise the money 

 necessary. And on the task he embarked at once with his habitual energy. 

 A public dinner in. connection with the Eoyal Southern Hospital took place a 

 little later. Boyce spoke to one of the toasts, and took opportunity to plead 

 for the new cause. Sir (then Mr.) Alfred Jones was present. Sir Alfred 

 used to relate with relish " before that dinner was over Boyce had a 

 hundred pounds out of me." Co-operation thus began between two men of 

 somewhat similar energy and kindred imagination. Their alliance tightened 



