Proceedings of the Linnean Society of London - University Library

LINNEAN SOCIETY OF LONDON, 35
There was a dignity and unconscious charm even in his business
letters that one associates with another generation, the simplest
replj' communicating the touch oi: a rare and genial personality.
Until they were nine and ten years of age Buckton taught his
own children in various subjects, from grammar and languages to
Euclid, drawing, and physiology. He had an unusual gift of exposition,
and was ever ready to share his knowledge with others. His
humility and simplicity made him one to be easily approached,
and he gave often his tools and specimens to small boys who
showed an interest in natural history. The story is still told of
the stonemason who stopped him in his pony-carriage in the
village street, to ask the cause of the colours in the rainbow. One
writes: " None who ever met him could fail to be struck with his
kindly courtesy, his intense vitality, his wide range of knowledge,
and his unflagging interest in every topic affecting mankind." In
spite of his physical disabilities he travelled in Italy, France, and
elsewhere, ascended Vesuvius, saw the Commune in Paris, and
climbed the barricades, his great will-power enabling him to
surmount difficulties that would have daunted many.
The visits to the observatory, which was built in his garden
some way from the house, were abandoned after a serious accident
which befel him in the autumn of 1882, when he overbalanced
himself in reaching the long focus of a Newtonian. He lay with a
double-fractured leg for some hours before he was found ; but his
recovery, though slow, was complete.
In politics a Conservative, he interested himself in all sorts of
public matters, acting as treasurer and chairman on various local
bodies. He was a moderate Churchman with broad sympathies,
and gave liberally to Church and schools. Among his large circle
of friends he numbered many of eminence, among them Tyndall
and Tennyson, of whom he saw a good deal. "Though sometimes
swift and uncompromising in his judgments, and of a quick temper,
he Avas withal of a significant self-control, especially as regards his
physical difficulties. Those most intimately associated with him
have no single remembrance of moodiness or murmuring. Bather
is their recollection, when some unexpected hindrance pi*esented
itself, of a lightly sad, resigned, half-humorous reference to his
disability, a reference not easily forgotten by those who heard it."
One has said that the most striking thing about him was his
" magnificent calm." He kept his powers to the last. The fine
and picturesque bust exhibited of him by R. Hope-Pinker in the
Academy of 1904, showed how little age had impaired his clear
intellect and vif^our. He was finishing some water-colour
sketches of Norway within a few weeks of his death. The end
was the natural end of old age. After three weeks' suffering and
illness following a chill, conscious to the last, his spirit passed
peacefully, on the niglit of [September 25th, 1905, surrounded by
his wite and his children.
" Truly a devoted, spiritual, knightlv nature,'" writes the present
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