WCP3651

[1]

Novr 1913.

Mrs Russel Wallace,¹

Broadstone, Wimborne.

Dear Madam,

As president of the Royal Geographical Society,² and on behalf of the Council, I desire to assure you of our deep sympathy with you in the loss which you have sustained by the death³ of your distinguished husband, Alfred Russel Wallace. Dr Wallace was a life member of our Society, having joined it so long ago as 1854, and was thus one of the oldest members on the list. [Note added in handwriting] He was awarded our Founder’s gold medal in 1892[.]

On his eminent services to Science I need not enlarge. His contributions to geographical knowledge, both in the Amazonian basin and in the Malay Archipelago, were of the highest rank, and some of his earliest contributions on these subjects are published in the original Journal of the Society. His interest in geographical science continued to the end, and his researches had a powerful influence in directing our subject into scientific lines.

He is porobably the last of the great scientific pioneers who began their work in the early decades of the last century, tho whose labours all departments of science are indebted for the [2] advanced stage which they have now reached.

Believe me to be, dear Madam, | Yours sincerely, | [George Nathaniel Curzon]

President, R. G. S.