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APRIL, 1911.)
DONALD WILLIAM FERGUSON
103
DONALD WILLIAM FERGUSON.
BY A. M. FERGUSON, M.E.A.S. [I have a sad pleasure in publishing this memoir. Donald Perguson was a valued contributor to these pages, and always ready to assist me in any obscure point of Oriental knowledge requiring acquaintance with the languages and literatures of the European nations connected with the East.-ED.]
Donald William Ferguson was born at Colombo, Ceylon, on the 8th October, 1853, died of pleurisy at Samanala,' Croydon, on the 29th June, 1910, in his 57th year, and was cremated at Golders Green on the 2nd July following. He was the third son of the late A. M. Ferguson, C.M.G., who arrived in Ceylon in 1837 and died there in 1892, being for the most part of those 55 years chief proprietor and editor of the Ceylon Observer. Mr. D, W. Ferguson was educated at Denmark Hill Grammar School, Camberwell, by O. P. Mason, the celebrated grammariau ; at Mill Hill School by R. F. Weymouth, D. Litt.; and at Regent's Park Baptist College, by Dr. Joseph Angus, M.A., author of "The Bible Handbook." He married, in 1883, Winifred Meredith, the daughter of the Rev. F, D, Waldock of Ceylon. His widow and two daughters survive him. Although delicate in childhood, knapsack walking tours in Switzerland with his elder brother so strengthened him that in his 17th year he was able, with the same companion, to walk in Bohemia 50 miles in one day and 34 miles the next.
Mr. Ferguson studied medicine under Dr. Frederick Roberts at University College, London, but gave that ap for literary work. He was for many years co-proprietor and co-editor of the Ceylon Observer with his father and with his cousin, John Ferguson, C.M.G., who has now been connected with Ceylon for nearly 50 years. By medical advice he had to retire to England in 1893, and spent the last 17 years of his life at Croydon in doing most valuable work relating to the ancient history of his native island, as the sabjoined list of his works in the British Museum Library will show. He had a good command of French, German, Dutch, Portuguese and Spanish : also an acquaintance with Latin, Italian, Sinhalese, Tamil and other languages. He inherited his father's talent for remombering accurately what he read. He was a frequent and accoptable contributor to the Athenum, Notes and Queries Indian Antiquary, Orientalist, and the Journals of the Royal Asiatio Societies of Great Britain and Ceylon, of both of which he was a life moinber. He was also a member of the Philological Society, where he made valued friendships with the late Dr. Richard Garnett, Dr. F. J. Farnivall, etc. He was a man of strong views, and hated all shans. Needless to say, he was a constant student in the British Museum Reading Room, from the catalogues of which the following list of his works is compiled :--
Ferguson, Donald William. See Kuhn, E. W.A. On the earliest Aryan element of tho Sinhalese Vocabulary ... Translated by D. F. (1885?). 8°.
See Ferguson, William, of the Ceylon Civil Service. List of writers on Ceylon, etc. (Enlarged by D. W.F.) [1886.] 8o.
See Daalmang, A. E. A Belgian Physician's Notes on Ceylon .... Translated from the Dutch by D. W.F. (1888 ?] 8°.
Captain João Ribeiro : his work on Ceylon, and the French translation thereof by the Abbé Le Grand. Extracted from the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Ceylon Branch, pp. 47, [Colombo ? 1888.) 8o.
See Ribeiro, J., Capitano, Ribeiro's account of the siege of Colombo in 1655 56. (Translated) by D. W. F., etc. (1891.) 8o.
The Reverend Philippus Ballous and bis book on Ceylon, pp. II, 47. Colombo, 1895. 16°
