LINNEAN SOCIETY OF LONDON. 



XV 



actually in the possession of the University and waiting for a 

 resting-place, or they were pouring in from various quarters. The 

 Natural History tripos was proposed. The appointment of a Pro- 

 fessor of Zoology, until that time unknown in either University, 

 was looming in the uncertain distance. What do we now see ? 

 The Museum built and partly occupied ; the collections increased 

 to an extent which could scarcely have been anticipated, chiefly 

 through the munificence of one of our Fellows, the Eev. F. W. 

 Hope ; the natural history specimens in the Ashmolean Museum 

 transferred to the new Museum ; honours conferred as a reward, 

 in part, of a proficiency in natural knowledge, and a Hope Pro- 

 fessor of Zoology actually appointed in the person of our own 

 esteemed and talented Fellow, Professor Westwood, and this pro- 

 vided for by an act of liberality, unexampled in late years, on the 

 part of the same gentleman to whom I have before alluded. Pro- 

 fessor Westwood is incessantly and energetically employed, in 

 conjunction with his colleagues, in carrying out these objects. 

 At present these absorbing duties necessarily occupy so much of 

 his time that we have to regret the temporary suspension of those 

 original researches which have so much enriched entomological 

 science ; but he is thus preparing not only the means of his own 

 future contributions to scientific literature, but especially laying 

 the foundation of a school of natural science in our oldest Uni- 

 versity, which, I fully anticipate, will at a future day be unsurpassed 

 in this country. 



Turning to Cambridge, alas ! one sole event absorbs all our 

 interest, and calls up all our sympathy. Within the last few days, 

 and almost before the ink was dry with which I had recorded on 

 these leaves the too sure anticipation of the approaching fatal 

 result of our admirable friend's illness, came the announcement 

 that the University had been deprived of its excellent Professor 

 of Botany, and we have to mourn the loss of as kindly and genial 

 a spirit, and as honest and true a man, as ever endeared himself to 

 his friends, or ever lived without an enemy. Professor Henslow 

 has been so well and so long known, and his merits are so uni- 

 versally appreciated, that I need not dwell upon them here. I 

 will only say that our grief for his loss is enhanced by the hope- 

 lessness of soon supplying his place in our esteem and affection, 

 or his equal in the earnestness, zeal and success with which he 

 carried out his benevolent schemes of enlarging and purifying 

 the enjoyment of his peasant parishioners, by opening to their 

 minds the beauties of nature, and showing them, as a Chris- 



