Excerpt from Catalogue of Mammals and Birds of Burma

The carbon print which accompanies this memoir has been prepared by the Autotype Company from a photograph taken of Blyth when he visited Dublin some ten years ago. It has been kindly contributed to me by Miss Blyth and her relative Mr. R. Loder, of High Beeches, Crawley, Sussex.

Edward Blyth was born in London on the 23rd December, 1810. His father was of a Norfolk family, and from him the son appears to have inherited both his taste for nature and the retentive memory for which he was so re markable. Blyth's father died in 1820, leaving four children, whose care and education now devolved on'the widow, a Hampshire lady, who at once sent Edward, the eldest boy, to Dr. Fennell's school at Wimbledon. Here the boy seems to have made unusual progress in his books, but the school reports describe him as of truant habits, and as being frequently found in the woods. He left school in 1825, and his mother seems at first to have intended him for an University career, and ultimately for the Church, but at Dr. Fennell's suggestion she sent her son to London to study chemistry under Mr. Keating, of St. Paul's Churchyard. He did not, however, long persevere in this study, being dissatisfied with his instructor's mode of teaching. His enthusiasm for Natural History pursuits disinclined him for any ordinary employment, and, on coming of age he embarked the little means he had in a druggist's business at Tooting. To this he seems to have given little personal attention. The management of the business was left to another, while Blyth devoted all his time to the study which engrossed his thoughts. Never, says his sister, was any youth more industrious; up at three or four in the morning, reading, making notes, sketching bones, colouring maps, stufiing birds by the hundred, collecting butterflies, and beetles - teaching himself German sufficiently to translate it readily, singing always merrily at intervals. He took a room in Pall Mall, to have readier access to books, and passed much of his time in the British Museum, in which, or in some kindred institution, he tried hard to find employment.

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