SELBORNIANA 
43 
Mary did lav down in the stall betwixt the ox and the ass, whosoever hath 
an ox and an ass be bound on that night to provide them provender the 
best that may be, and in like manner also that on such a day all poor folk 
should be given their fill of good victual by the rich.’ ” 
Would that “ sweet St. Francis ” were with us still to plead anew for 
our “ Sister Lark.” 
Death of an Old Contributor. — Many of our older 
members will hear with regret of the death of Mr. W. J. C. 
Miller, which occurred on February n at Kingswood, Bristol. 
William John Clark Miller was born at Beer Head, in South 
Devon, on August 31, 1832. Graduating from the Independent 
College at Taunton, at the University of London, but prevented 
by the theological tests from entering that of Cambridge, he 
became Professor of Mathematics and Vice-Principal of Hud- 
dersfield College. Here he began to edit the mathematical 
columns of the Educational Times, collecting the annual volumes 
of Questions and Solutions until 1897 1 and, with the object of 
fostering a love of Nature, literature and general knowledge 
among the students, he started, and for some years edited, the 
Huddersfield College Magazine. In 1876 Mr. Miller was appointed 
Registrar to the General Medical Council, and soon afterwards 
took up his residence at Richmond. Here he took an active 
part in the local Athenaeum, and in the then existing branch of the 
Selborne Society, and was the founder of a Literary Society over 
which he presided from 1887 to 1898. On his retirement from 
active work in 1897 he went to live at Bournemouth, when his 
friends had the pleasure of having a collected edition of his 
essays and Nature-studies edited, with a biographical introduc- 
tion, by Mr. H. Kirke Swann. In this volume, issued by the 
publishers of Nature Notes, are nine papers that Mr. Miller 
contributed to our columns, with eight others, mostly literary. 
It also contains a portrait of the author. 
Nature Photograph Competition. — We have been asked 
to call attention to a series of prizes, consisting of a gold, two 
silver, and one bronze medal, offered by the Portsmouth and 
Gosport Natural Science Society for the best series of lantern 
slides illustrating the life-histories of birds, animals or insects 
photographed in their natural surroundings. Full particulars 
can be obtained from the Hon. Secretary, Mr. Percy Maggs, 
Pisgah, Brougham Road, Southsea. 
