ages towards an increased understanding of nature and which appear to emerge in the whole world only once in more than a century. In this article, the hope and purpose is to review briefly some aspects of Rutherford's life and work, more in an endeavour to obtain inspiration and teachings for our own generation than to attempt to give his life in complete detail; much of the latter cannot for obvious reasons be written yet. The influence of heredity and early environment in the development of genius is an interesting but still incompletely understood subject. Everyone knows that it is from their parents that children derive their bodily and mental qualities; nevertheless, parental influence is not confined to the hereditary constitution of the genes transmitted to the children, but, owing to the long association of children with their parents during the impressionable years, many acquired characteristics and habits of the parents are unconsciously handed on to the children. It is often these acquired characteristics and habits which have a profound influence on a child's career. Looking at Rutherford's origin and upbringing from this point of view we find that, while favoured with a distinctly more than average physical and mental endowment, he was even more fortunate in the qualities which he acquired from his parents and from the country environment in which he was raised. The first twenty-four years of his life, prior to leaving New Zealand, gave him an ideal equipment of physical development, health, training in all its aspects, habits of work and character which fitted him to profit to the full from the larger opportunities of university life at Cambridge to which he was so fortunate as to be called. It was these earlier influences which were of profound importance in assisting him to attain to the unique position in world science to which he rose. Rutherford inherited high qualities from both his parents, from his father a balanced yet fertile and inventive mind and a rich physical endowment; from his mother, a very high mental equipment. In the habits and qualities he acquired from their example he was however probably even more fortunate. Lord Rutherford's parents both arrived in New Zealand as young children nearly 100 years ago, in the very early days of the colony. His father, James Rutherford, arrived in Nelson from Scotland in April, 1842, at the age of three, while his mother, Martha Thompson, came to New Plymouth in the early fifties with her widowed mother. They were married in April, 1866, and they had in fairly rapid succession twelve children, of whom Ernest, afterwards Lord Rutherford, was the fourth. He was born at Spring Grove, between Nelson and Motueka, on August 30, 1871. The whole family possessed high mental capacity and good physique. Moreover, under the influence of their parents, they were a singularly united, happy and religious family. Rutherford's father was a man of great character, of fine quiet disposition, straight and honourable. He was a good, ingenious and resourceful engineer. A characteristic of the father, as later of the son, may be expressed in the words of the poet: “He doeth little