On the 13th May this year Vilhelm Thomsen passed away in his residence in Copenhagen. He was an honorary member of the Royal Asiatic Society, as of a long series of other learned societies, and numerous distinctions of the highest order had been conferred upon him. In his home city even the man in the street knew that he was one of Denmark's foremost sons, and in the annals of philology his name has long ago been entered as one of the very greatest. And this distinguished and world-famed

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... was the most unassuming, the most gentle of men. He was happy in his harmonious home, his friends loved him dearly, and everybody felt at ease in his company. He could speak with the same warm interest to a boy about his games and preoccupations, and to the savant about philological or historical problems. And everybody who came into touch with him felt the influence of his rich and warm personality. He led the quiet and peaceful life of the true scholar, and its chief events are easily summarized. Vilhelm Ludvig Peter Thomsen was born in Copenhagen the 25th January, 1842, but spent most of his boyhood in Randers. He came to the Danish University in 1859 and took up the study of theology, but soon gave it up and devoted his time to philology, which had already taken his interest in school. Several eminent scholars, such as Madvig, Westergaard, C. W. Smith, and Lyngby were then teaching in Copenhagen, and they found an eager listener in young Thomsen. His interest in philological matters, however, carried him further than they could lead, and when he passed his final university examination in 1867, his range of knowledge was very wide indeed, and he had already written his first learned essay: Bet magyarishe sprog og dets stammeslaegtskab (The Magyar language and its affinities). JRAS. OOTOBBE 1927.