NOTICES OF ESSEX ORNITHOLOGISTS.
19
{34. 4429), the month before his death, and consisted of some
lengthy and valuable " Critical Notices " on Mr. Hancock's Catalogue
of the Birds of Northumberland and Durham. His diary, containing
his observations on birds, insects, &c, is stated (Entomologist, x.
p. 53) to be still in existence; but I have not been able to ascertain
its present whereabouts.
He died on June 29, 1875, aged sixty-seven years all but two
days. I was present at his funeral, which took place in the small,
secluded burial-ground adjoining the Friends' Meeting-house at
Epping. His almost unrivalled entomological collections, which,
during his lifetime, had attracted many a well-known entomologist to
the quiet town of Epping, were deposited after his death, in
February, 1876, on loan by his executors in the Bethnal Green
branch of the South Kensington Museum, where they have ever
since been preserved intact and known as the " Doubleday Col-
lections." In 1877, a catalogue of them (South Kensington Museum
Science Handbooks) was published by the Lords of the Committee of
Council on Education. It is to be regretted that the scientific
value of the collections is lessened by the absence of any indication
of localities attached to the specimens—a fault of nearly all old
collections. Obituary notices of Doubleday appeared in the En-
tomologist (x. p. 53—with photograph), the Entomologists' Monthly
Magazine (xii. p. 69), the Proceedings of the Entomological Society
(1875, p. xxxi.) and the Field (July 17, 1875).
ENGLISH, James Lake (1820—1888), "was principally
known as a practical field-student of Cryptogamic botany, and as a
lepidopterist; but his knowledge of birds and skill as a taxidermist
entitle him to a place among Essex ornithologists. His father had
been a soldier in the Dragoon Guards, who settled in Epping as a
gardener, and in that quiet country-town English was born on August
21st, 1820, in the cottage in which he lived nearly all his life. He
received some education at Palmer's School at Epping, but did not
shine as a scholar, his talents being of a mechanical and observational
character. He aided his father until the latter's death in 1836, and
then being thrown upon his own resources he collected insects for the
boys in the Friends' School at Epping. His skill attracted the notice
of Henry Doubleday, who engaged English as an assistant and col-
lector, in which he was highly successful, and great numbers of
Doubleday's specimens were the result of English's acuteness and per-
severance. He was also well skilled in the culture of plants and his
mechanical genius was undoubtedly great. He constructed a lathe
C 2