Many of Cope's friends having expressed an opinion that it would be well if a short memoir of him were prefixed to this posthumous work, and his sole surviving brother having written to me that he and his nieces would rather leave it in my hands than in those of anybody else, I could not hesitate to undertake the task.

Edward Meredith Cope was bom in Birmingham on the 28th of July 1818. He was for some time at the Grammar School of Ludlow under Mr Hinde, and then for about five years at Shrewsbury, where he remained until October 1837, when he commenced residence at Trinity College Cambridge.

During the first years of his Shrewsbury life Dr Butler, late Bishop of Lichfield, was Headmaster; for the last year and quarter Dr Kennedy. Cope throughout his school career was always first or among the first of boys of his own age and standing. For to a great natural aptitude for study and scholarship he joined a strong will and a determination to use his best efforts to excel in whatever was given him to do. Not that he was a bookworm by any means: for he enjoyed extremely the society of his friends and loved innocent recreation in almost any form. Thus though he was not made, and never sought, to distinguish himself in any of them, he thoroughly enjoyed nearly all the usual games and amusements of the place.