Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 24, 1913.djvu/264

 IN MEMORIAM : LORD AVEBURY (1834-1913).

BY H. K. WHEATLEY, D.C.L.

The Folk-Lore Society, in common with many other important societies, has suffered a great loss by the death, on May 29th, of its distinguished member, Lord Avebury, who joined the Society in 1880, two years after its foundation. Throughout his long life and amid the multifarious interests which filled it, he always retained a special interest in the subject to which our Society has been devoted. His first work of importance was on Prehistoric Times (1865), and a few years later his Origin of Civilisation and Primitive Condition of Man appeared. His last work, Marriage, Totemism and Religion : an answer to Critics, was published in 191 1. In the following year was published in Folk-Lore (March, 19 1 2) his reply to Mr. Lang's review of this book.

Lord Avebury was elected a Vice-President in 1889, an office which he held until his death.

The name of the eminent banker, author, naturalist, and states- man, known to all as Sir John Lubbock until 1900, when he was created Baron Avebury, had been for years a household word, and his many-sided career as a man of science and a man of affairs is one to marvel at. He was an indefatigable worker, and when we look at the voluminous list of his publications we might easily suppose that he had no other occupation, if we did not know that he was a man of business in one of the most anxious of professions. He was also occupied in many national movements, the most important of which related to early closing and public holidays. As the founder of Bank Holidays, he obtained the humorous sobriquet of "St. Lubbock."

My friend. Dr. Philip Norman, a life-long friend of Lubbock, has kindly communicated to me some interesting particulars of his