After a few years Thomson found it necessary to appoint an assistant, and Mr. Donald McFarlane, who had distinguished himself in the Mathematics and Natural Philosophy classes, was chosen. Mr. McFarlane was originally a block-printer, and seems to have been an apprentice at Alexandria in the Vale of Leven, at the time of the passing of the first Reform Bill. After some time spent in the cotton industry of the district, he became a teacher in a village school in the Vale of Leven, and afterwards entered the University as a student. He discharged his duties in the most faithful and self-abnegating manner until his retirement in 1880, when he had become advanced in years. He had charge of the instruments of the department, got ready the lecture illustrations and attended during lecture to assist in the experiments and supply numerical data when required, prepared the weekly class examination paper and read the answers handed in, and assisted in the original investigations which the professor was always enthusiastically pursuing. A kind of universal physical genius was McFarlane; an expert calculator and an exact and careful experimentalist. Many a long and involved arithmetical research he carried out, much apparatus he made in a homely way, and much he repaired and adjusted. Then, always when the professor was out of the way and calm had descended on the apparatus-room, if not on the laboratory, McFarlane sat down to reduce his pile of examination papers, lest Monday should arrive with a new deluge of crude answers and queer mistakes, ere the former had disappeared. On Friday afternoons at 3 o'clock he gave solutions of the previous Monday's questions to any members of the class who cared to attend; and his clear and deliberate explanations were much appreciated. An unfailing tribute was rendered to him every year by the students, and often took the form of a valuable gift for which one and all had subscribed. A recluse he was in his way, hardly anybody knew where he lived--the professor certainly did not--and a man of the highest ability and of the most absolute unselfishness. An hour in the evening with one or two special friends, and the study of German, were the only recreations of McFarlane's solitary life. He was full of humour, and told with keen enjoyment stories of the University worthies of a bygone age. For thirty years he worked on for a meagre salary, for during the earlier part of that time no provision for assistants was made in the Government grant to the Scottish Universities. By an ordinance issued in 1861 by the University Commissioners, appointed under the Act of 1858, a grant of £100 a year was made from the Consolidated Fund for an assistant in each of the departments of Humanity, Greek, Mathematics, and Natural Philosophy, and for two in the department of Chemistry; and McFarlane's position was somewhat improved. His veneration for Thomson was such as few students or assistants have had for a master: his