[[1]]
Royal Gardens Kew
June 22/[18]84
My dear Brian [Houghton Hodgson] *1
I am delighted to hear that you have escaped from your icy prison & with no bad effects. It must have been a sore trial of patience to you all – but if travellers will go to Alpine heights they must lay their account to hardship.
I went to the Geographical Society the other night to hear Mr. -- -- < William
Graham> *2 account of his ascent of Kinchin. [Kanchenjunga] -- he seems to have got up to 24,000 feet or very near it, but has not made an observation of any
[[2]] kind[,] sort or description. He was accompanied by a Swiss guide & is no doubt a bold mountaineer.
Curiously enough he did not suffer from difficulty of breathing or discomfort of any sort! & he coolly puts all other descriptions of such suffering down to the imagination. I had to speak afterwards & could not help saying that he reminded me of a [illeg. deleted word] man , who being never sea sick himself , would not believe that there was any such thing in others.
That windbag Sir R. Temple spoke absurdly in praise of the paper talking most ignorantly as if no one else had written on the Himalayan chain before. So I took the liberty of reminding him that such
[[3]] men as Gerard *3 , Strachey *4 , Hodgson, Thomson *5 & many more had told us all about the Himalaya that Mr -- -- < William Graham> had -- though none had performed the same plucky exploits, or ascended nearly so high. --
King *6 of the Calcutta Garden & Duthie of the Saharanpur d[itt]o are both home know [sic?] and I have been at the India Office with them about getting a better botanical organization in India.
Sir W. Elliot & dau[ghter] lunched with us two days ago. He asked much for you -- he is quite blind but most cheerful -- he calls it his last visit to London, & it may well be such.
We are all pretty well. Harriet *7 is certainly better at Eastbourne.

[[4]] Symonds *8 holds out wonderfully by dint of chloral -- it is really marvellous -although there is no real improvement of his heart & lungs. Hyacinth is bothered as usual by hay-fever. at this season: Joey [Joseph Symonds Hooker] is all right -- Willy
[William Henslow Hooker] has gone yachting in Scotland.
We went to the opera the other night -- the first time for years -- to hear Le Nozze di
Figaro, my prime favourite -- & it was delicious. Hyacinth had never heard it.
[William Turner Thiselton--]Dyer is only pretty well, though he has got through the winter wonderfully -- With united love to you both | ever dear Brian | y[ou]r truly affectionate | Jos. D Hooker [signature]
Curiously enough Mr Townsend has for a pupil a son of my neighbour Mr Asser, from whom I bought the property at Sunningdale.
ENDNOTES
1. Brian Houghton Hodgson (1801
—1894). A pioneer naturalist and ethnologist working in India and Nepal where he was a British civil servant. Joseph Hooker stayed at Hodgson’s house in Darjeeling periodically during his expedition to India and the Himalayas, 1847--1851, and named one of his sons after him.
2. Probably refers to William Woodman Graham (c.1859--unknown). British mountaineer . In 1883 Graham and his Swiss guides made several ascents of
Himalayan peaks including an unverified claim to have reached a record breaking altitude by climbing Kabru, part of the ridge that extends from Kanchenjunga, not
Kanchenjunga itself as Hooker states in this letter.
3. Alexander Gerard (1792--1839). Himalayan explorer. In the course of his millitary service he carried out many important surveys of routes and regions in India.
Particularly notable for his early accounts of the geological structure of the
Himalayas.
4. Lieutenant--General Sir Richard Strachey (1817--1908). British soldier & Indian administrator chiefly employed with public works. Studied the geography, botany and geology of the Himalayas. Was instrumental in the formation of the Indian meteorological department. Served as President of the Royal Geographical Society from 1888--1890. Accompanied Joseph Hooker and Asa Gray on their botanical excursions in western USA in 1877.
5. Thomas Thomson (1817--1878), surgeon with the East India Company before becoming a botanist. Friend of Hooker who travelled with him in India and helped him to write the first volume of Flora Indica .

6. Sir George King (1840--1909). British Botanist. Superintendent of the Royal
Botanic Garden, Calcutta and Cinchona cultivation in Bengal, 1871--1898. First
Director of the Botanical Survey of India, 1890--1898.
7. Harriet Anne Thiselton-Dyer née Hooker (1854--1945). Oldest child of Joseph
Hooker and his first wife Frances. Botanical illustrator and wife of William Turner
Thiselton--Dyer. Her husband was Assistant Director of RBG Kew (1875--1885) and later Director (1885--1905), succeeding her father.
8. Reverend William Samuel Symonds (1818--1887). English geologist; father of
Hyacinth Hooker.
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