John Allan Broun

Abstract

IT is only a few weeks ago that it became our painful duty to record the untimely death of a distinguished mathematical and experimental physicist, and we have now to mourn the loss of one equally distinguished in-observational inquiry. John Allan Broun was born at Dumfries, where his father had, we believe, a normal school especially intended for young men about to enter the navy. Upon the death of his father, Mr. Broun, then about twenty years of age, went to the University of Edinburgh, and speedily became a successful student in more than one branch of knowledge. But his strongest attachment was always to physical science, and the late James D. Forbes, who was at that time Professor of Natural Philosophy at Edinburgh, considered Mr. Broun as one of his very best pupils. A friendship was thus formed which lasted through life.