Owen, Sir Richard (1804-92): was born at Lancaster, and educated at the local Grammar School, where one of his schoolfellows was William Whewell, afterwards Master of Trinity. He was subsequently apprenticed to a surgeon and apothecary, and became deeply interested in the study of anatomy. He continued his medical training in Edinburgh and at St. Bartholomew's Hospital in London. In 1827 Owen became assistant to William Clift (whose daughter Owen married in 1835), Conservator to the Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons. It was here that he became acquainted with Cuvier, at whose invitation he visited Paris, and attended his lectures and those of Geoffroy St. Hilaire. The publication, in 1832, of the "Memoir on the Pearly Nautilus" placed the author "in the front rank of anatomical monographers." On Clift's retirement, Owen became sole Conservator to the Hunterian Museum, and was made first Hunterian Professor of Comparative Anatomy and Physiology at the Royal College of Surgeons. In 1856 he accepted the post of Superintendent of the Natural History department of the British Museum, and shortly after his appointment he strongly urged the establishment of a National Museum of Natural History, a project which was eventually carried into effect in 1875. In 1884 he was gazetted K.C.B. Owen was a strong opponent of Darwin's views, and contributed a bitter and anonymous article on the "Origin of Species" to the "Edinburgh Review" of 1860. The position of Owen in the history of anatomical science has been dealt with by Huxley in an essay incorporated in the "Life of Richard Owen," by his grandson, the Rev. Richard Owen (2 volumes, London, 1894). Huxley pays a high tribute to Owen's industry and ability: "During more than half a century Owen's industry remained unabated; and whether we consider the quality or the quantity of the work done, or the wide range of his labours, I doubt if, in the long annals of anatomy, more is to be placed to the credit of any single worker." The record of his work is "enough, and more than enough, to justify the high place in the scientific world which Owen so long occupied. If I mistake not, the historian of comparative anatomy and palaeontology will always assign to Owen a place next to, and hardly lower than, that of Cuvier, who was practically the creator of those sciences in their modern shape, and whose works must always remain models of excellence in their kind." On the other hand, Owen's contributions to philosophical anatomy are on a much lower plane; hardly any of his speculations in this field have stood the test of investigation: "...I am not sure that any one but the historian of anatomical science is ever likely to recur to them, and considering Owen's great capacity, extensive learning, and tireless industry, that seems a singular result of years of strenuous labour." -address at Leeds (British Association, 1858) by. -admission of descent of species. -articles by. -on a badger of Pliocene age. -on the brain. -Mrs. Carlyle's impression of. -and Hooker. -conduct towards Huxley. -Darwin abused by. -on Darwin and Maillet. -and Darwinism. -on ephemeral influence of the "Origin." -Falconer and. -Huxley on. -on Huxley's election to the Athenaeum. -ignores Darwin's work. -influence of. -isolation among scientific men. -lecture on birds by. -letters to. -letter to the "Athenaeum." -"Life of." -on lowness of animals. -on Macacus. -on mammals of Old World. -on morphology of vertebrata. -review in the "Quarterly" of the "Origin." -"Palaeontology" by. -on parthenogenesis. -review in the "Edinburgh Review" by. -on simple and multiple organs. -on use and disuse. -and Bishop Wilberforce's review. -visits Down. -attack on Darwin in his "Anatomy of Vertebrata." -attitude towards Natural Selection. -mentioned.
Owls and hawks, as agents in seed-dispersal.
Oxalis, bulbils of. -cleistogamic flowers of. -dimorphism of. -pollen-tubes of. -seeds of. -trimorphism of. -O. acetosella, sensitive leaves of. -variation in length of pistil and stamens. -O.