MEMOIR OP THE LATE JOHN HENRY GURNEY. lf>7 
Mr. John Henry Gurney, the only son of Joseph John Gurney, 
the distinguished philanthropist, was born at Earlham Hall on the 
4th July, 1819, and from his earliest days evinced a love of 
natural history, which, though to some extent inherited,* was 
doubtless inherent in him, and strengthened by circumstances 
favourable to its development. At ten years of age he was sent 
to a private tutor at Leytonstone, on the borders of Epping Forest, 
whore ho made the acquaintance of Henry Doubleday.t To 
Doubleday, I believe, he subsequently owed an introduction to 
'1'. C. Heysham, who was afterwards indebted to him for many 
Norfolk rarities, and with whom he was for many years a constant 
correspondent; Heysham presented him with a copy of ‘ Montagu’s 
British Birds,’ which is now at Northrepps. No wonder that, in 
such a spot, and with such companions, his tastes became confirmed, 
and were so directed as to result in those habits of exact observa- 
tion and cautious deduction for which in after life he was 
pre-eminently noted. From Leytonstone he went to the Friends’ 
School at Tottenham,'}: where probably his opportunities for the 
study of natural history were not so great as they had been in 
the Forest ; but that he did not abandon his favourite pursuits there 
is evidence, as he told of having got into trouble for converting 
his school-desk into a dissecting- table, on which to study the 
anatomy of a bird he had obtained, much to the detriment of the 
desk and to the disgust of his master. 
When a -boy lie was taken by his father to pay a visit to 
Temminck, but he was never much on the Continent, though in 
after years he carried on a very extensive correspondence with 
naturalists in all parts of the world. He was also introduced to 
Yarrell about this time, and his interleaved copy of Temminck’s 
‘ Manuel d’Ornithologie,’ a work which he highly prized, contains 
the following inscription : — “ Bought by the advice oj William 
Yarrell, which he gare me when I teas at Tottenham School.” It 
bears date in Friends’ style, “5th month, 1834,” which probably 
* Hunt mentions Joseph John Gurney as the owner of “ a fine collection 
of Mexican birds ; ” he also possessed a Norfolk-killed Bee-eater, and a pair 
of Glossy Ibises, shot on Breydon. 
f During his stay at Leytonstone he visited a well-known Raven’s nest in 
Wanstead Heronry, a remembrance he was very foud of recalling. 
7 One of his friends here was the late William Edward Forster. 
