BALFOUR (Francis Maitland, 1851-1882, Naturalist)

ALS to the Rev. M. C. F. MORRIS (son of Francis Orpen Morris, 1810-1893, Naturalist) thanking him for his kind letter of congratulation on my appointment as Professor. You ask in the same letter for my photograph. I would willingly send you one if I had it to send. I intend to be photographed soon and will try & remember you then...”, 2 sides 8vo.,with original autograph envelope, Trinity College Cambridge, 17th June

Balfour was the younger brother of the politician, Arthur Balfour. He went to Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1870 and was elected a natural science scholar of his college in the following year, and obtained second place in the Natural Science Tripos of December 1873. He lost his life while attempting the ascent of Mont Blanc. He was regarded by his colleagues as one of the greatest biologists of his day and Charles Darwin's successor. Although other universities were anxious to secure his services, and he was invited to succeed Professor George Rolleston at Oxford and Sir Wyville Thomson at Edinburgh, he declined to leave Cambridge, and in the spring of 1882 the university instituted a special Chair of Animal Morphology for his benefit. He never delivered a lecture in his new position. In the first term after his appointment he was prevented from working by an attack of typhoid fever, and went to the Alps for his health. Balfour and the guide Johann Petrus were killed, probably on 19th July 1882, attempting the ascent of the Aiguille Blanche, Mont Blanc, at that time unscaled.
Charles Darwin referred to him as the "English Cuvier". Huxley thought he was "the only man who can carry out my work", and that his death was one of "the greatest loss to science in our time".

Item Date:  1882

Stock No:  42668      £475

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