IN MEMORIAM DOCTOR DIRK FOK VAN SLOOTEN

In the midst of his work Van Slooten has been suddenly called away<br />at the relatively early age of 61. It was known that his heart was not too<br />good, but it was expected that living a quiet life he would be able to finish<br />his life's work, the monograph of the Malaysian Dipterocarpaceae, to<br />which he had been able since 1951 to devote all his time and concentration<br />undisturbed by other duties. The striving towards the completion of this<br />work on the most important family of Malaysian forest trees always<br />occupied his mind and had been to a large extent the main object of his life.<br />Van Slooten's ambition was to produce careful work, meticulous in<br />all details. This made him a slow worker, but at the same time one of the<br />trustworthy kind. This trend towards perfectionism expressed itself<br />equally in the preliminaries and routine work towards his objective.<br />Through his method of working progress was steady but unfortunately<br />relatively slow. Other factors beyond his control added to this result.<br />Besides delays due to World War II, Van Slooten performed many other<br />official duties in the same earnest way in which he carried out his<br />research work. Any spontaneity and opportunism he had in his character<br />was suppressed through his orderliness. Only in exceptional and very<br />urgent circumstances would he make decisions a l'improviste. It is of<br />course questionable whether one can deduce a man's character from his<br />published writings. Whether this thesis be accepted as a generality or not,<br />it is certain that it held for Van Slooten. His care for details, for straight-<br />forwardness, for trying to find the truth in his work found a remarkable<br />parallel in his office work, and his private life. He wanted things to be<br />clean and orderly. Even on excursions, which he made surprisingly seldom,<br />his clothes were as speckless as they could possibly be in the circumstances.