WILLIAM COLE, 1844-1922. 171 
List Pension of £50 per annum, “in view of his contributions. 
to the study of natural history and to scientific education, and 
of his old age.” With this, and a further annual pension of 
£75, raised by subscriptions from friends and administered by 
a Committee of the Council of the Essex Field Club, he was 
able to spend the last few years of his life in retirement at St. 
Osyth, where, in a Martello Tower, on the Essex shore, he and 
his brothers and sisters had for years past made their home. 
During the last few months he sank into a semi-comatose 
condition, scarcely heeding what happened around him, and 
towards the end needing to be tended like a child by his sole 
remaining brother Henry. 
He passed away on June 27th, 1922, in his 79th year, and was. 
laid to rest in the cemetery at St. Osyth. 
William Cole was of commanding presence. Stout in build, 
and with massive head and full face with deep-set eyes—the 
face of a thinker—he struck the observer with a sense of dignity 
which inspired respect, and made one conscious that his was a. 
personality of an uncommon order. 
With his social and religious views we are scarcely concerned. 
here. In politics he was an avowed Socialist of the mild Fabian 
type; and he maintained communion with the Established 
Church until his decease. 
There is one phase of Cole’s character upon which we wish 
to touch very lightly. It has been thought that he was a difficult 
man to work with, intolerant of opposition, and that his many 
helpers in the Club’s affairs were sooner or later repelled by his. 
brusqueness: in this connection, the present writer need only 
adduce his personal experience. During sixteen years of close 
official contact with Cole, once only did any disagreement arise, 
and a feeling of soreness develop, and it should be said that, 
when the cause of the difference was explained, no more 
warm-hearted, generous apology could be desired than was. 
spontaneously offered by the subject of this memoir. 
In conclusion, no better summing-up of William Cole’s life- 
work can be given than that expressed by Mr. E. N. Buxton, 
in a letter written on receipt of the news of his death, and which 
We are permitted to quote. “‘He taught many people to use 
their eyes and gave a new interest in life tomany more. Essex 
owes him a great debt.” fet le. 
