Page:Dictionary of National Biography. Sup. Vol II (1901).djvu/233

 author at his best; in a really masterly survey of the facts Flower put forward, more clearly and succinctly than had been done before, the reasons for separating the American edentates from their supposed Asiatic and African allies.

Flower's series of memoirs upon the whales forms one of the most enduring monuments to his industry. At the time when he took up the study of this group there were but few anatomists engaged in that study, which moreover was hampered by lack of material in many museums. In carrying out these researches Flower visited and reported upon the collections in many museums in Europe, and neglected no chance of observing the stranded monsters as often as that could be done upon our own coasts. Of these memoirs the most important are perhaps his account of the little-known Berardius (Trans. Zool. Soc. 1878), a ziphioid form from the shores of New Zealand. The elaborate account of the osteology of the cachalot established among other things the great probability of there being but a single species of sperm whale of world-wide range (ib. 1869). He discovered for the first time the rudiment of a tibia in the rorqual, thus showing that this whale, like its ally the 'right' whale, is a less degenerate creature in this respect than many toothed whales where there is no trace at all of an actual hind limb, the supporting girdle alone being left. A long paper on the characters and classification of the delphinidae (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1883) is the most important of Flower's classificatory papers upon the cetacea. Its conclusions have been universally adopted by subsequent writers. In addition to the novel facts contained in the papers quoted, Flower investigated and increased existing knowledge of right whales and rorquals (ib. 1864), hyperoodon (ib. 1882), mesoplodon (Trans. Zool. Soc. 1878), the remarkable American freshwater forms inia and pontoporia (ib. 1869), the Chinese dolphin (ib. 1880), the common dolphin, the 'grampus,' and some other species. In fine it may be said that no one, except the absolute pioneers of investigation into the anatomy of whales, when everything was new, has increased our knowledge of the group more than Flower. He is fitly represented in the whale-room of the museum over which he presided by a splendid series of both skeletons and plaster casts illustrating the forms of these creatures, casts which he himself originated and carried out in detail.

As to Flower's other zoological work, two memoirs, one upon the panda, ælurus fulgens, and the other upon the aardvark, proteles cristatus, call for special mention. These are models of what such work should be. The extreme care in the description, and the illustration by appropriate woodcuts of the facts and structure of these at the time (Proc. Zool. Soc. 1869 and 1870) little-known carnivora show Flower at his best, as does also the memoir upon the musk deer (ib. 1875). Papers upon such extinct types as the remarkable ancylopod, homalodontotherium (Phil. Trans. 1873), hysenarctos (Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc.), and the Sirenian halitherium (ib. 1874), illustrate the care he bestowed upon the extinct members of the order which he selected for study.

In anthropology Flower did much work, the value of which was shown by the fact that he was from 1883 to 1885 president of the Anthropological Institute, and more than once president of the anthropological section of the British Association. His principal memoirs concern the osteology of the Fijians and of the Andamanese; a number of his more general contributions to anthropology are reprinted in No. 6 below.

His principal publications other than memoirs in the 'Transactions' of the Royal Zoological and other learned societies, and his articles on 'Mammalia,' 'Lemur,' 'Lion,' &c., in 9th ed. of 'Encyclopædia Britannica,' are: 1. 'An Introduction to the Osteology of the Mammalia,' London, 1870, 8vo; 3rd ed. (revised with the assistance of Dr. Gadow), 1885. 2. 'Catalogue of Specimens illustrating the Osteology and Development of Vertebrate Animals Recent and Extinct. Part i. : Man,' 1880. 3. 'Fashion in Deformity,' Nature Series, 1881. 4. 'The Horse: a Study in Natural History,' 1890. 5. 'An Introduction to the Study of Mammals Living and Extinct' (with Mr. Lydekker), 1891. 6. 'Essays on Museums and other Subjects,' 1898.  FOOTE, LYDIA (1844?–1892), actress, whose real name was Lydia Alice Legge, was a niece of Mary Anne Keeley [q. v. Suppl.] She made her first appearance at the Lyceum on 1 April 1852 as Edward, a child, in 'A Chain of Events.' She was subsequently at Sadler's Wells, the Victoria, and at Manchester, and made her first appearance at the Olympic, 31 Aug. 1863, replacing Miss Kate Saville as May Edwards in the 'Ticket-of-Leave Man.' On 1 Nov. 1864 she was the original Enid Gryftydd in Tom Taylor's 'Hidden Hand' ('L'Aieule'). She 