Obituary.

News from Melbourne records the death of Mr E. M. Edgecombe, an old New Zealand journalist, and at one time proprietor of the Waikato Times.

At Bartholomew's Hospital, London, recently, J. M. Morton, author of Box and Cox and many other popular comedies, died in destitute circumstances.

News has been received from Sydney of the death of Mr David Parry, formerly a New Zealand journalist, who succumbed in the Sydney Hospital to injuries received in a tram-car accident.

On June 23rd, at Lexington-avenue, New York, Matthew Somerville Morgan—well known in the world of literature and art by his fine cartoons in the short-lived London Tomahawk—died, in his 51st year, of pericarditis, complicated with pleurisy.

Mr. C. Morton, of the City Typefoundry, London, died on the 17th May, at his residence, Essex, at the age of 55. He was greatly esteemed by all his workmen, and by his numerous intimate acquaintances. For the last four or five years he had given up the personal control of his business, owing to failing health.

On 6th April, Mr A. B. M'Glashan, of the firm of Adam & Charles Black, publishers, Edinburgh. He had been with the firm over twenty-six years, and had been a partner for about a year. He had represented the house abroad and in the colonies, where he had made many friends. The cause of death was influenza, followed by pleurisy.

Mr R. Clay, of the well-known printing firm of R. Clay & Sons, London, died on the 24th May, at the age of 51. He was a thoroughly practical printer, and had patented many improvements in printing machinery and appliances. Among these were a machine for perfecting a half-sheet with a single cylinder, a method of holding down stereo plates by atmospheric pressure, and a lock-nut for printing machines.

Mr Andrew Campbell, inventor and manufacturer of printing-presses, died at Brooklyn on the 13th April, in his 69th year. He was a clever mathematician and a versatile inventor. He obtained fifty patents, applied to every branch of press-building, and these represented but a fraction of his inventions. The marvellous machines employed in Scribner's, Harper's, and in printing Ayers' almanacs were wrought out by him. He is, however, best known as the inventor of the Campbell Country Press. He first engaged in business in 1855, and retired in 1880.

Home papers record the death, in his 64th year, of Mr John Parsons, for the past eighteen years manager of the Graphic, and the guiding spirit of the printing department of the Daily Graphic since its first issue. He was apprenticed to Messrs Clayton, Crane-Court, Fleet-st., and assisted in the production of the first number of the Illustrated London News. He was afterwards appointed overseer of the machine-department of Messrs Clowes and Sons; and in 1872 took charge of the printing department of the Graphic. He has left a wife and family and innumerable friends to mourn his loss.