Obituary of David Low

List 2 of Nullius in Verba: Darwin's Greatest Secret (Sutton 2014) contained the name David Low as someone who was apparently first to be second with two apparently unique Matthewisms from Patrick Matthew's (1831) On Naval Timber and Arboriculture.

Here is some interesting information from Prof. David Low's 1859 obituary. Here.

DEATH OF PROFESSOR LOW 

We regret to learn from the last number of the North British Agriculturist that David Low Esq late Professor of Agriculture in the University of Edinburgh is no more. Three or four years since he resigned his chair in consequence of the declining state of his health and was succeeded by John Wilson Esq who is personally known to many of our readers and who it will be recollected visited Canada during our lasť Provincial Exhibition at Hamilton and who has evinced on more than one occasion a desire to bring our productions under the favorable notice of the British public.

 Mr Low it appears was a native of Berwickshire and his father was extensively engaged in the management of landed property and enjoyed a high reputation. His son soon manifested a disposition to follow his father's pursuits for which he afterwards showed the highest qualifications. He likewise took an active part in the management of his father's extensive farms in Berwickshire which was the means of greatly improving his knowledge of practical agriculture for which he was afterwards so distinguished.

 In the year 1817 appeared Mr Low's first work entitled Observations on the present state of Landed Property and on the prosperity of the Landholder and Farmer. The termination of the war had greatly reduced prices and great agricultural distress was consequently felt. The treatise was characterised by mature judgment and marked a sympathy with the position of the tenant farmer and secured for the author an early and high reputation. In 1825 Mr Low removed to Edinburgh where he afterwards resided. In 1829 the Quarterly Journal of Agriculture was commenced mainly at his suggestion a work that has been since published in connection with the Transactions of the Highland Society which has done good service to the cause of British Agriculture generally and to which Mr Low was a regular and most valuable contributor. In 1831 he succeeded Mr Coventry as Professor of Agriculture in the University a post which he filled with distinguished honor and ability for near a quarter of a century.

 In the Highland Society, Mr Low always took a warm interest and rendered it most important services during the greater portion of his life. He was successful in establishing an agricultural museum in connection with the University towards which he enlisted the aid of the Government and several private individuals contributing not a little himself.

 The writings of Professor Low were numerous. Besides the treatise already mentioned and his numerous contributions to the Journal of Agriculture and the Transactions of the Highland Society he published in 1834 The Elements of Practical Agriculture a work of great and original merit which has gone through several editions and was soon translated both into French and German and highly appreciated on the continent. His large and costly treatise on The Breeds of the Domesticated Animals of the British Islands in two large quarto volumes appeared in 1842. It was illustrated with colored portraits of the animals painted by Mr Shiels for the museum the portraits reduced by Nicholson the price being necessarily high 16 guineas.The French Government immediately ordered its translation. In 1815 appeared a fuller treatise on the Domestic Animals than was contained in the expensive illustrated edition without plates which is the best work on the subject in the English language. Another work soon followed On Landed Property and the Economy of Estates a work which enters very fully into the principles and practices of territorial management. The first edition of an Inquiry into the nature of the Simple Bodies of Chemistry came out in 1844 containing many ingenious speculations which excited considerable curiosity and attention so that a third edition appeared in 1856.

 Professor Low died in the 73rd year of his age. His character was high toned and unsullied his manners gentle and unassuming and his loss will be long felt by a very large circle of admiring friends and readers of his works. So long as the man of integrity and high principle is esteemed and venerated so long will the memory of David Low remain a bright example in the performance of duties which require a combination of such qualities as sound judgment and high moral rectitude