Collectanea de Diversis Rebus: Addresses and PapersEade, Peter, Sir
Science
Collectanea de Diversis Rebus: Addresses and Papers
Eade, Peter, Sir
English essays; Speeches, addresses, etc., English
Although the late Mr. John Gurney’s talents were never, I believe,
especially directed to our class of study, yet his tastes for the bright
and the beautiful were well known. And though his affliction had of late
years debarred him from the complete visual enjoyment of the beauties of
nature, yet his devotion to the improvement of the rural charms of his
own home, and his public-spirited expenditure upon the scheme for the
laying out of Mousehold Heath, and its appropriate development, showed
that he had in him that form of mind out of which the true lover of
nature’s creatures, as well as nature’s charms, necessarily arises.
But this side of Mr. Gurney’s mind will come home to us as naturalists
much more forcibly when we recall the great act of his life, in which he
was so heartily and so earnestly engaged when death removed him so
suddenly in the midst of his useful and public-spirited career. I, of
course, allude to his great Castle-Museum scheme for the removal of our
grand Museum collection, with its surroundings, to a new and larger and
more appropriate position on the Castle Hill. We all know the generous
liberality with which he sought to ensure this grand scheme being carried
out. We have all noted the quiet and business-like sagacity with which
the various steps necessary for the effective doing of this work were
taken under his inspiration. And I am sure we recognise how he was
actuated not only by a desire to raise the scientific _status_ of the
county and city generally, but also to assist those Norfolk workers in
nature’s fields whose accumulated results are now to be seen under this
roof.
His large and increasing views for the good of this city, and its general
welfare, have been so thoroughly and so publicly appreciated on all
sides, that it is not necessary for me to add one word more. His name
will remain as that of a public man at once generous and right-minded.
And I can only hope on behalf of this Society, and that of other kindred
ones, that nothing will occur to prevent the full development and
carrying out of that Castle scheme, which, if effected, will, in my
opinion, have a large and important influence not only upon the future
scientific progress of Norfolk generally, but also upon the intellectual
position which our famous old city will hold in the time to come.
Mr. Hampden G. Glasspoole, who has also recently died, had been a member
of this Society from its commencement, and had contributed two papers to
its proceedings. These were entitled “Biographical Memoirs of some
Norwich Botanists,” and “Memoir of Lilly Wigg.” He had also published
several papers in _Science Gossip_. He was for several years a member of
the late Norwich Microscopical Society; and of the London Quekett Club.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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