ALFRED JAMES EWART

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2 ALFRED JAMES EWART Alfred J ames Ewart was born in Liverpool on the 12 February 1872, his father, Edmund Brown Ewart, B.A., being Lecturer in Chemistry and Director of the chemical laboratory of the Liverpool Institute where Ewart himself received much of his earlier education. Ewart matriculated at the University of London in 1888, obtaining a first class, and in the next year passed the Intermediate Science examination of the same University. In 1890 he obtained honours in Physics in that examination, and in the same year entered as a student at University College, Liverpool. Three years later he took the degree of B.Sc. of the University of London as an external student with first-class honours in Botany. About this time he acted as demonstrator in Botany in University College, Liverpool, at the same time carrying out his first original investigations in plant physiology. The results of these researches appeared as two papers in Transactions of the Liverpool Biological Society in 1894 and 1895 respectively, under the titles of Observations on the Vitality and Germination of Seeds and Observations on the Growth and Germination of the Pollen-tube. In 1894 Ewart was awarded an 1851 Exhibition Scholarship and with this proceeded to Leipzig to work with Pfeffer, at that time the leading plant physiologist on the Continent. The researches he carried out in Pfeifer s laboratory were described in the thesis he presented for the Doctorate of the University of Leipzig and which was published in the Journal of the Linnean Society in 1896 under the title On Assimilatory Inhibition in Chlorophyllous Plants. On returning from Germany Ewart visited Java where he worked at the famous Buitenzorg Botanical Garden on the effects of tropical insolation and on contact irritability in plants. The results of his researches on these questions were subsequently published in the Annales du Jardin Botanique de Buitenzorg. Ewart returned from Java in May 1897 and obtained the degree of D.Sc. of the University of London in that year. At this time Professor Hillhouse, on account of ill-health, obtained temporary leave of absence from the Chair of Botany in Mason College, Birmingham, and Ewart was OBIT. [465] 2 K

3 466 Obituary Notices appointed Deputy Professor of Botany at Birmingham during his absence. On Professor Hillhouse s return in May 1898, Ewart became an extension lecturer for the University of Oxford, at the same time continuing his plant physiological researches in the botanical department of that University. These resulted in the publication in 1903 of a book entitled On the Physics and Physiology of Protoplasmic Streaming in Plants and in his obtaining the degree of D.Sc. of the University of Oxford. On leaving Oxford Ewart returned to Birmingham, and in April 1900 he was appointed Science Master at King Edward s School. From 1902 he also held a Lectureship in Botany at the Municipal Technical School in Birmingham. In October 1904 he resigned his post at King Edward s School on his appointment as Lecturer in Botany in the University of Birmingham. This post he only occupied until December 1905 when he was appointed Professor of Botany in the University of Melbourne and Government Botanist to the State of Victoria. The latter position he relinquished in 1921 when the Professorship of Botany at Melbourne was made a full-time appointment. Ewart s activity as a botanist may be judged from the fact that a list of his publications contains no fewer than 156 titles. Up to the time of his departure for Australia his work had been entirely physiological, his contributions covering a diversity of topics, including, apart from those already mentioned, papers in Annals of Botany on Diaheliotropism of Radial Members (1896), The Effects of Tropical Insolation (1897), <c The Action of Gold and of Sunlight upon Aquatic Plants, The Action of Chloroform on COj- Assimilation (1898), Root Pressure in Plants (1904), and **The Resistance to Flow in Wood Vessels (1905). In this period of his life probably his most important original contribution was on the Ascent of Water in Trees, published in Philosophical Transactions in 1905, in which data were presented dealing with the rate of upward movement of water in trees and the pressures required to bring about this movement. During this period of his life Ewart produced his translation in three volumes of Pfeffer s Physiology of, the first volume of which was finished in Oxford in 1899 and the third in Birmingham in Ewart had the distinction of being the first Professor of Botany appointed in Australia, but when he went to Melbourne the botanical department of the University was small and only half the Professor s time was allocated to University work, the rest of his time, in respect of his appointment as Government Botanist, being spent in work for the National Herbarium. This led to the development of Ewart as a systematic botanist. When he took up his duties in the herbarium he found it in a rather unsatisfactory condition, and he therefore devoted much energy to improving it. He

4 Alfred James E wart 467 drew up a list of desiderata, increased the number of exchanges, and improved the library. In 1908 a recording census of Victorian plants was prepared by Ewart and published, and this census formed the basis of the work of a Plant Names Committee, of which Ewart was chairman, and which undertook the task of providing popular names for the plants of the Victorian flora. The result of this work appeared in 1923 as a publication entitled A census of the plants of Victoria with their regional distribution and the vernacular names as adopted by the Plant Names Committee. This was only one of his activities in the field of systematic botany. He published many other contributions to this branch of botany, which culminated in his most important work as a systematise the Flora of Victoria, published in 1930, which is the standard work on the subject. Throughout his life in Australia, Ewart always showed a lively interest in the applications of botany to local problems, and the list of his publications includes a large number of papers dealing with questions of local economic importance. A selection of these includes Tree Planting and Forest Preservation (1907), Bracken and its Binding Effect on, Coastal Soil and Eradication of Bracken (1908), Prickly A Fodder Plant for Cultivation (1910), On Bitter Pit and the Sensitivity of Apples to Poisons (1911), Weeds, Naturalised Aliens and Poison Plants of Victoria (1912), and The Native Fibre Plants (1918). In particular he took part in investigations on poisonous plants causing disease in cattle and horses in Western Australia and the Northern Territory, the results of which have proved of great economic importance for stock breeders. Ewart played a great part in the development of forestry in Victoria. From the creation of the State Forest Department in 1908 until his death, Ewart was Chairman of the Forests Examination Board, and he was largely responsible for the curriculum for the training of students in the State Forestry service. He took a great interest in the Forest School of Victoria established at Creswick in 1910, and in 1925 he compiled a Handbook of Forest Trees for Victorian Foresters, which was published by the Forest Commission. Ewart was also one of the original members of the Committee of Management of the National Park at Wilson s Promontory, and in 1928 he became Chairman of the Committee. As the greatest authority on the local flora, and with his keen interest in forestry, he was able and anxious to render very valuable service in the management and improvement of this national park. Ewart thus devoted much of his energy towards investigations into systematic botany and problems of economic importance, such as are called for in a country which may be regarded as new from a scientific 2 k 2

5 468 Obituary Notices point of view. Yet he did not altogether abandon his first love for plant physiology and from time to time accounts of investigations on different aspects of the physiology of plants came from his pen. Thus in 1907 he published in Proceedings of the Royal Society a paper On the Supposed Extracellular Photosynthesis of Carbon Dioxide by Chlorophyll, and in Philosophical Transactions a second paper on the Ascent of Water in Trees, a subject to which he returned in 1912, while he made other contributions to plant physiology to within a year of his death. When Ewart first occupied the Chair of Botany at Melbourne, the botanical department shared a building with the department of Zoology. With the continued increase in the number of students, particularly in the years succeeding the war of , it became necessary to supplement the existing accommodation with an army hut. At the same time the growing demand of research could not be adequately met in the restricted space available. Ultimately, a fine new building was provided to house the botanical department. This new Botany School was planned by Ewart, and the building and equipment supervised by him in every detail. The foundations were laid in 1928 and the building opened in In addition to the organization of teaching and research in his own department, Ewart also served the University of Melbourne as Dean of the Faculty of Science from 1920 to 1925 and again in 1929, as Dean of the Faculty of Veterinary Science in 1916, 1917, and from 1932 to 1937, and as Dean of the Faculty of Agriculture in 1917 and He was an active member of the Royal Society of Victoria, serving on its Council from 1908 to During part of this time he was the Honorary Secretary of the Society and later he was elected its President. He was a frequent contributor to the Proceedings of the Society. He was also an active member of the Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science and was twice President of the Biological Section of the Association. During the meetings of the British Association in Melbourne in 1914, Ewart was a local secretary of the botanical section and responsible for the arrangements for that section. Ewart was also a foreign member of the Czecho-slovak Botanical Society of Prague, and was a Fellow of the Linnean Society for nearly 40 years,' from 7 April 1898 until his death. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in There can be no doubt of the leading part Ewart played in the development of botany in the continent of Australia for nearly twenty-two years, a period which saw the most vigorous years of an exceptionally energetic scientific worker. During the last two or three years of his life his

6 Alfred, James Ewart 469 activity was lessened by ill-health, but he yet published several papers during these last years. He died on 12 September 1937 when 65 years old, a year before the date of his intended retirement. Ewart was twice married. He married first in 1898 Florence Maud Donaldson, by whom he had two sons, and secondly in 1931 Elizabeth Bilton. For details of Ewart s work in Australia I am much indebted to notes supplied by Professor W. E. Agar, F.R.S. and Dr Ethel I. McLennan of the Departments of Zoology and Botany respectively of the University of Melbourne. W. Stiles.