XXX 



Obituary Notices of Fellows deceased. 



As a companion he was charming and sympathetic, possessed of a noble 

 simplicity. To younger men he was ever generous and kindly, and many in 

 this country will remember the encouragement received from his kindly 

 appreciation. 



Weismann found intense delight in the world of art. On his visits to 

 Italy he studied with the keenest pleasure the works of the great masters. 

 He was probably even more devoted to music. " His memory was wonderful, 

 and he was able to keep up his playing of Bach's works until his eightieth 

 year, although his fingers almost refused to do their work, and his sight 

 nearly failed him." With Huxley he might have quoted the beautiful lines 

 of Landor : — 



" Nature I loved, and, after Nature, Art. 



I warmed both hands before the fire of life ; 

 It sinks and I am ready to depart.'' 



The words are singularly appropriate to the great naturalist, who " passed 

 away peacefully . . . while his son was playing some of his favourite music." 



In 1867 Weismann married Mary Dorothea, the eldest daughter of 

 Adolf Gruber, of Genoa. The second daughter afterwards married another 

 Professor at Freiburg, Eobert Wiedersheim, while the eldest living son, 

 August, studied Zoology, and also became a professor at the same University. 

 In summer vacations the large family used to meet at Adolf Gruber's 

 beautiful estate on the Lake of Constance, and here Weismann pursued his 

 researches on the fresh- water fauna. 



Weismann's family consists of four daughters and one son, the youngest 

 of the family, who was only four years old when his mother died (1886). 

 His second daughter is married to Professor W. N. Parker, of Cardiff. Both 

 Weismann and his wife were very musical, and the gift is inherited in a 

 higher degree by his son, Julius Weismann, who takes a prominent place among 

 the younger composers. His playing was a constant source of joy to his 

 father. 



Weismann once asked the present writer what he thought of Bismarck and 

 his policy. This was before the day when a wretched and bitter old man 

 strove to magnify his own importance by boasting of forgery, and the world 

 was startled to learn that, while condemning folly, it had extended its 

 sympathy to crime. Would that it had been otherwise ; for it is of the 

 highest interest to know what such a German as Weismann would have said 

 of war deliberately provoked, and provoked by the methods of Bismarck. 

 At the time he considered the policy good, but talked as if he was quite 

 aware that there was much to be said on the other side. On his seventieth 

 birthday he spoke of the great national elevation of the Franco-German War, 

 and of how the " unexpected new birth of our fatherland, filling us all with 

 joy," perhaps contributed towards the cure of the essentially nervous trouble 

 with his eyes. Weismann and his family had never liked the Prussians or 



