James Napier MilneAuthor(s): A. W. StelfoxSource: The Irish Naturalist, Vol. 27, No. 8/9 (Aug. - Sep., 1918), p. 129Published by: Irish Naturalists' Journal Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25524767 .

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I9i8. Obituary. 129

College, Belfast, where he faithfully carried out his arduous teaching duties until his resignation of the post in 1902. During his well-earned

retirement, Dr. Cunningham lived in the south of England.

JAMES NAPIER MILNE.

On 13th June there passed away in Glasgow James Napier Milne, a

naturalist in the truest sense. Born at Forres, in Elgin, in 1841, Milne's

parents came to Ireland when he was quite a boy, and took up their

residence in Navan, Co. Meath.

On the completion of his course as a teacher at the Training College, Dublin, he was appointed to the school at Armoy, Co. Antrim.

Subsequently he became principal in the school at Waterside, Londonderry,

leaving this to take charge of that at Culmore, where he remained for

upwards of twenty years, until his retirement in 1903. During this

time he was actively interested in entomology, conchology, and was a

keen fisherman. On his coming to reside in Belfast entomology ceased

to be a possible study, for, as he told me once, the sight of an elderly

gentleman with a butterfly net skipping nimbly round a lamp-post after

dark, attracted considerable attention, the last thing in the world Milne

desired ; while his investigation of the suburban lanes with treacle pot and lantern was resented by the lovers who frequented such places.

Milne, therefore, turned his attention to the land and freshwater shells,

assisting others to explore unworked districts in Mayo, Kerry, and Donegal, and at the same time steadily working at the local shells of the north

eastern counties.

A man of the most modest and retiring disposition, he recorded

practically none of his finds, so that future workers will never realize

the amount of field work accomplished by him. For a companion in

the field his was an ideal nature ; no discomforts produced a grumble, no failures damped his good humour. But it was as a raconteur of his

experiences that he will be best remembered by his most intimate friends, to whom his quiet mirth and fund of anecdote were alone revealed. In

his last years he suffered greatly from rheumatism, which prevented him

from undertaking long excursions. Nevertheless he still continued his

local work, until the death of his sister, Mrs. Hunter, with whom he lived

necessitated his removal to Glasgow. Like many keen naturalists he was gifted with remarkable sight and

appreciation of detail ; that vision which can not only see differences, but that much rarer gift, the faculty of seeing relationships between

things of different habit and appearance. I hope to collect and publish in the future some of Milne's most

interesting finds in the realm of conchology, but of his entomological work I am not in a position to speak. To these two studies Milne's

attention was by no means confined, as all animals and plants were of

like interest to him,

A. W. Stelfox,

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