MR. J. B. WALKER. The "Tasmanian News" of Saturday says:-

It is with unfeigned regret that we chronicle the death of Mr. James Backhouse Walker, the senior partner of the firm of Messrs. Walker and Wolfhagen, solicitors, of this city. Mr. Walker was seized with influenza in the beginning of the week, which soon passed into pneumonia, but up to mid night last night he was progressing satisfactorily, the fever having nearly left him. Earlythis morning he went to sleep, and the heart during sleep collapsed. He could not be aroused from this comatose condition, and at 10 o'clock this morning he passed quietly away. The deceased, who came of an old Tyne family, was a son of the late George Washington Walker, an his toric name in the south of the island. He was a native of the colony, where he first saw the light of day in the year 1841, and received his education in the High School, Hobart, and the Friends' School, York, England, and when he came out to Tasmania he took up commercial pursuit, and entered the office of the late Hon. T. D. Chapman. From there he passed into the Hobart Sayings Bank as accoun tant, and held that position until the early seventies, when he took up the law as a profession, and on July 7, 1876, he was admitted to practice as a barrister, solicitor, and proctor of the Supreme Court of Tasmania. The subject of this notice was a pro found student, and had perhaps one of the finest private libraries in Tasmania.

For many years he has been closely identified with higher education, and when the Rev. George Clarke was appointed Chancellor of the University of Tasmania, on the decease of Sir Lambert Dobson, Mr. Walker, who was an original member of the Council, was elected to the position of Vice Chancellor. He was a member of the Royal So ciety, and his contributions to the historical sections will serve as fitting landmarks to keep his memory green. Perhaps Mr. Walker is better known to the general public by his articles in the press dealing with the history of the colony and its aboriginal inhabitants. At the time of his decease he had in preparation a work on the black inhabitants of Van Diemen's Laud. The deceased was quiet and unassuming in his manner, and was one of those useful citizens which the capital of the colony can ill afford to lose. Mr. Walker was unmarried, and. lived with his sisters in Davey-street.