Sir Henry Gilbert, the famous agricultural chemist, died at Harpenden
on Monday. Born in 1817, he studied chemistry in Glasgow, London, and Giessen (under Liebig), and in 1843 took charge of the chemical laboratory established at Rotham- sted by Sir John Bennet Lawes, with whom he remained ir close association for fifty-seven years. The value of his researches into the application of chemistry to the cultivation of crops and the feeding of livestock was attested by a variety of distinctions, diplomas, degrees, and offices ; and in a recent issue of the Year-Book of the United States Department of Agriculture he is ranked with Sir Humphry Davy, Lavoisier, and Liebig. In a word, he enjoyed a world-wide reputation while remaining entirely unknown to the "man in the street." Sir Henry Gilbert, it should be noted, was a striking instance of a man who triumphed over a physical drawback—he lost an eye by a gunshot accident in early youth—peculiarly dis- abling to one constantly engaged in scientific experiments.
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