[[1]]
Camp
Fe[bruar]y 23/[18]86
Dear [Asa] Gray
I have a horrid cold, & so cannot do better than write to thank you for yours of 8th, &
for Synopt[ical]. Flora Suppl[ement].
Well, it is good news that you have gone back to Ranunculaceae, you will I hope be
able to gallop through the Thalamiflorae.
I am still on Laurineae, but nearly done. The 1--celled anthered Litsaeaceae I have
followed Bentham in bringing under one genus Lindera -- though I feel satisfied that
they should make 3 or 4 by habit & inflorescence. The latter is very curious & often
difficult to make out. Bentham did not attempt to understand it -- had he attempted it
the Gen[era] Plant[arum] would not now be finished! Laurineae is one of those
orders that he would have wished me to do, not because I could do it better, but
because I have more patience with that sort of analysis that is required & which is
necessary, even if I do not make so good a use of it. I did
[[2]] however suppose that Bentham had done generically the S[outh]. American
ones for [Robert] Schomburgk & [Richard] Spruce. You never I think tried your hand at
such a job of exotic plants as classifying [1 word crossed out, illeg.] any of these
obscure arborescent tropical orders. They are a great strain, but I prefer such work
to such jerky work as Bot[anical]. Mag[azine]. But you have your full share of
troubles in your own Compositae & other Orders.
I am now printing Indian Polygonums 70 species!
By the way I was staggered in looking into your Man[ual]. [of the] Bot[any]. [of the
Northern United States] for a Willow[?], to find, p. 461 that you were waiting for
Andersson[']s Monograph in D[e].C[andolle]. Prodr[romus] published in 1868, whilst
your issue is dated 1880 on the title page but 1868 in the Note at the back of the
dedication -- surely this is Hocus--pocus.
I have received [John Merle] Coulter's Rocky Mt Flora, a curiously unequal book, but
I suppose a very serviceable one. What a pity that he gives no elevations & hardly
ever distinguishes alpine plants as such. But how do you define an alpine plant? I
can't except as Tom defined an
[[3]] Archdeacon. I asked Ball & he couldn't.
We are in a fix for a P[resident]. L[innean]. S[ociety]. which [John] Lubbock is about
to resign. I know no fit man but [William Thiselton] Dyer. Lubbock & others press
me to accept, but I cannot trisect myself. The Camp & Kew are all I can manage -- it
tires me so to add London that I shall take no more Society work after this year of the
Royal -- besides the frightful loss of time. If Dyer won't take it[,] it must I suppose be
[William] Carruthers, who has neither Scientific nor Social position for it, & whose
conduct to Bentham, & action in joining a secret conspiracy to overthrow the
P[resident]. & Council in the matter of Dyer's election to the Sec[retar]yship, & then
putting an utterly unknown & ignorant man into the Secretary's place [1 word crossed
out, illeg.] were simply shocking.
Ball won't take it. He wants to go abroad every year. No one but Dyer could get the
new school of Botanists to rally round the Society.
By the way I have been good 2 hours over D. Jackson's Biog. Biograph[ical] notice of
Bentham for the Linnean, which won't do at all -- he can't write English to begin with,
& is utterly incompetent even with your & my notices to help him to do it.
I wrote to Madam Wallon *1 urging her paying up the Legacies to the Linnean & the
Relief fund of the Royal, -- she answered asking to buy the portrait "if she could
afford it", & making no allusion to
[[4]] the legacies -- I have sent her a stinger in return & if she does not come down
with the money (only about £300 out of her £15000) I shall send her a concluder.
There is a very fine Botanical Library to be sold that did belong to a friend of mine, a
Mr Watson Taylor, an amateur Botanical Artist, whose drawings I thought equalled
Bauers. He belonged to a wealthy family -- died some 15 years ago or more & left
his Bot[anical]. books to his brother a wealthy swell[?] who wants to part with them.
Is there a chance of St Louis buying them? There are 140 works, 345 vols including
Boltons Fungi; Bulliard &c & CavanillesIcones; Crantz Stirp[iu]m; De Prodr[omus]
XIV vols; Deless[ert] Icones; Grevilles Scot[tish] Crypt[ogamic] Flo[ra]; HBH
[Humboldt, Bonpland and Kunth] Plant Equnots[?]; Hook Exot[ic] Fl[ora]; Brit[ish].
Junger[mmani]a Folio Ed[ition]!; Bot[anical] Misc[ellany]; Comp[anion to the]
Bot[anical] Mag[azine]; Muscol[ogica] Brit[tanica].; Hort. Gran.; Jacquin
Obs[ervationum Botanicarum]; Fl[ora] Austr[iaceae]; Plant[arum] Rar[iorum];
Stapel[iarum]; Miscell[anea]. Austr[iaca].; Collect[anea]; Oxalis; Select[arum]
Stirp[ium]; Hort[us]. Bot[anicus]. Vindob[onensis].; Redouté Rosa & Lilia[cées].;
R[uiz] &P[avón] Fl[ora] Peru; Scopoli; Sowerby's Fungi; Turner's Fici; Vaillant Fl
Dauph; Wallich Pl[antae] As[iaticae]. Rar[iores]; Waldst[ein] & Kit[aibel]; -- all in
splendid order I believe, Russia[?] board & gilt.
The owner a comparative stranger to me does not know what to ask, or I what to advise, but it
is a rare chance. What would you say? £500? I think I shall ask Wheldon.
Ever aff[ectionatel]y y[our]s J.D. Hooker [signature].
*2 Is
Sargent right in styling you one of the "immortal 8" of the French Academy? If
so I should have congratulated you. I always thought you should have been chosen
before A[lphonse] D[e] C[andolle] a very long way.
ENDNOTES
1. Mary Louisa Wallon, George Bentham's great niece who, on his death, inherited
the bulk of his estate.
2. The text which runs from here until the end of the letter is written vertically up the
left margin of page 1.
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